Propositions
by Rinari7
Summary: Caitlin Todd will be coming in to sign the contracts and start working for NCIS tomorrow, but tonight he couldn't care less. Dealing with it afterwards—that might prove more challenging, for both of them.
1. Chapter 1

"Hello?" _God_ , even her greeting was a crisp warning. He set down his glass of bourbon—a proper glass, for once—on the coffee table. He figured he would do this in the living room, use the damn space once in a while.

"Kate. It's Agent Gibbs."

"How did you get this number?" He would have preferred a different response, but she _was_ Secret Service. Ex-Secret Service.

"You think it's difficult for an investigator to get someone's number?"

"Touché." Her tone shifted into something with a little more pleasure in it, something that sparked down his spine. "So is this to make me a proper job offer?"

"Figured we could skip the actual proposal and just discuss the terms."

"You're an arrogant bastard." There was a breath of a laugh.

"So I've been told." He grinned.

"I'm sure. How many wives?" Strange question for someone he would otherwise swear was flirting with him. She was good, though. Even more of a catch than he had thought.

"What gave it away?"

"You're attractive enough to get a woman to fall for you, but difficult enough to drive them away after a while. And you don't strike me as the kind of guy to play around, or do things halfway."

"Are you a profiler, by any chance?"

"I've had some training." Her tone was almost coy. Almost.

"You don't just get _some_ training in the Secret Service."

"Touché."

"Is that going to be your favorite response? I can't work with someone who just agrees with me all the time. That's not the kind of job this is."

"My response depends on what I hear. So far I haven't been hearing anything that would merit a different one."

This conversation was killing him.

"How about you come in to NCIS central offices tomorrow to sign the contracts? I'll leave your name at the gate."

"E-mail me them tonight. I'm sure you can find that piece of information, too. I'll take a look at them in advance."

"Initiative. I like to see that."

"You don't get where I am—was—without it." He heard her swallow. But he wouldn't coddle her and he would bet she didn't want it.

"You could go far in NCIS, with some training."

"I can go far anywhere I want to."

 _You don't have to prove yourself to me_ almost ran over his tongue, and then he ran his tongue along the inside of his teeth and thought the better of it.

"So do you make a habit of getting your current wife to pick you up from work? Nice car, by the way. I wasn't aware that was within investigative agents' pay grade."

"Wife? You want me to believe you didn't notice I wasn't wearing a ring?"

"I noticed." Her voice was slightly husky, and she cleared her throat.

Damn right she noticed, with some of the glances she had given him on the actual Air Force One when she thought he wasn't looking. On the Alpha Foxtrot 29000, too.

"She's not my girlfriend, either."

"You seemed to know each other well." Cautiously, lightly, an _I might give a damn but you'll never know_ tone.

It wasn't really any of her business. "Not a girlfriend."

"Double-check, don't take someone's word for it. Wasn't that one of those things you tried to teach me?"

"I succeeded."

Her breathy half-laugh did things to his insides.

"I also told you, if you pulled that kind of crap at NCIS, I wouldn't give you a chance to resign." He needed the reminder.

"What—that's the only time I've ever done anything like that." She exhaled, sniffled, and he heard liquid being poured into a glass. "If you're going to hold that over me the entire time I'm there, I might as well not start."

He softened his tone, feeling like an ass. He was one, but he didn't often feel like it. "That's not what I meant, Kate. I'm sorry, about Major Kerry. And you won't hear about it again from me."

"Good. I'm not even at NCIS yet."

"That's the problem." She wasn't off-limits yet, but she should be, she would be when she started putting those instincts and balls and smarts to work for his team. He wanted her in so many different ways. And there he felt like an ass again. Her lover had just died.

"Pardon me?"

"I want you to work for me."

"There we go." She still sounded subdued.

"What?"

"Sometimes a woman likes to hear it put explicitly. With a little less of the assumption it's already a done deal."

"I have three ex-wives, Kate. Do you really think I'm that bad at propositioning a woman?"

She exhaled. He might have been flattering himself to think it was shaky, but he wanted to think he could affect her like that.

"Well, since they're ex-wives…" A challenge, a pause, and he heard her take a drink of something.

"But no, Gibbs, I don't think you're that bad at it, or that you would hesitate to go after what you want." It wasn't breathy, but it had a stilted rhythm that sent a heady warmth curling in his gut.

The bourbon's burn helped to clear his head, and while he was fishing in the silence for something to say—to figure out what would be wise to say—her voice muddled him up again. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"With or without a hangover?"

"Good question. I guess I'll be on the job the moment I sign that contract, won't I?" He heard her take another gulp, then the _clink_ of a glass on some surface.

"You sure will be."

"Without, then."

"Good." _The rules are there for a reason, Marine._

More silence, then a sigh. "Good night, Gibbs."

"Good night, Kate."

He set down his phone. The bourbon tasted like sawdust and missed opportunities.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** **So I was trying to write something else and this happened. No clue what it is. Yay for banter and a touch of angst?**


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: All right, well, I really did intend for this to be a one-shot when I first wrote it. But it's evolved into this huge fic, and so, here it goes.**

 **To anyone who already put this on their favorites list, without seeing the entire thing: you have my apologies, and I completely understand if you un-favorite it again, but I hope you do like the rest of it.**

 **Rating has been changed for upcoming cursing, violence, and suggestive content.**

* * *

The number was unknown, and he scowled when he realized he must have fallen asleep on the couch. "Hello?"

"Gibbs?" Her voice sounded a little higher, a little less crisp than before. He drew in a breath, tensing. _God_ if that wasn't a glorious sound to wake up to.

"Yeah?" He checked his watch. It hadn't been too long, no more than an hour or two since he'd sent her the documents, still before midnight but no longer a really appropriate time to call someone. "What's up, Kate?"

"There's nothing in either the contract or the Code of Conduct that forbids fraternization. Except between agents and their direct superiors, like any other professional organization."

"You woke me up for _this_? Rule Number Three for my agents: don't call me unless it absolutely can't wait."

"I'm sorry I woke you, but I'm not one of _your_ agents yet, Gibbs." She had to keep bringing that up, apparently. _Consider her already on the team. Off-limits, Gunny._ "But never mind. You're right. I lost track of the time; I'm sorry. We can discuss this tomorrow."

"Well, I'm awake _now_." Rising, he grumbled low in his throat as he headed towards the coffee maker like a homing pigeon to the roost.

"So you couldn't actually fire me for dating a coworker."

"I can fire any of my agents if I their ability to do their job has been compromised." He stabbed at the battered, faithful machine, exhaling as he heard it _click_ into action.

"But you'd need empirical evidence their performance has suffered."

"Do you _want_ to date DiNozzo?" He kept himself from growling, but just barely.

"No! _God_ , no. I just want to know exactly which terms I'd be working under."

"Don't date someone you'll see every day."

"I'm going to guess that's your rule, and not NCIS's."

"Damn right. My team, my rules."

"Should I get out my crochet hook again?" She was beginning to respond to his gruffness in kind, with cross sarcasm.

He knew he should tone it down but couldn't quite bring himself to. "If it helps you remember, Agent Todd, by all means. What is this about? Already got your eye on someone?"

She swallowed.

If not Tony, and Ducky was hardly a candidate, who else had she met? _Besides me_. He began to tap his foot as he started through a mental list of the agents she had interacted with at Headquarters. Two more minutes until his coffee was done.

"No."

That pulled him up short, made him toss the word over in his mind. "Then why all the fuss?" It had to be a lie.

"Most people who aren't in a similar situation don't have the patience for our kind of work. And the Secret Service isn't as unpredictable as criminal investigations." A deep breath, then she continued quietly. "I don't want to end up regretting the terms of employment later."

"Either you're married to this job, Agent Todd, or you're not doing it right."

"Is that the voice of experience?"

"Logic."

The noncomittal hum in his ear crackled down his spine and curled his toes, prompting him to take a long sip of his coffee. It was scalding hot, and he downed another gulp.

"Kate, I need to know—"

"You can count on me, Gibbs. I won't be going after Agent DiNozzo." A pause that was too long. "Or anyone else who might come to the team. Any other agents would hardly impact my work, and you wouldn't technically be allowed to intervene there anyways."

She hadn't ruled him out, whether she realized it or not. "Officially, I can only fire you for flirting if you're flirting with me." Another sip of his coffee. _He must really hate himself._

"And unofficially, you always get what you want." Her half-laugh came from somewhere deep in her throat this time.

"If you're offering, Kate…" Playing with fire was addictive, when it wasn't quite fire; flicking on a lighter with a gasoline-covered thumb. The coffee was good and _hot_ and bitter.

"Depends. You've already said you want me to work for you. Is that all?"

He was struck speechless for a moment, several in fact, as he mentally cycled through _exactly what he wanted_. He'd had a taste, in that airplane bathroom, with her pressed up against him, and now, again, with her voice in his ear, and his pants felt a little tighter even as he felt like an ass again.

She took a drink, and he wondered if it was still alcohol. She seemed lucid enough, though. A sigh echoed in his ear, her voice tight and tense. "I'll take that as a 'yes, Kate, that's all'. Thanks for clearing that up, Gibbs. I'll see you tomorrow."

"No." He swallowed, forcing words over numb lips that gradually warmed again, once his mind was finished shorting out. Caffeine didn't help clear it.

"Don't bother coming by?" Far from upset, her tone carried a sort of wry laugh.

"Rule Number Eight, Agent Todd: Never assume." Still, he was running through scenarios of why she was pushing. People only took risks they judged worth it: she would have no problem finding another job, but he wasn't sure they would all be jobs that would appeal to her. NCIS did.

"And what's the rule about flirting with the boss?"

He closed his eyes and swallowed, lubricating his throat with his drink again. "Twelve. Never date a coworker."

"Have you ever broken it?"

"Not that one. Not since I made it." He wouldn't be breaking it _now_ , _right now_ , if he were to just… Another gulp. He handled the machine a little more gently this time as he ordered another cup.

"And who was the lucky lady to ruin it for the rest of your team? One of the exes?" Her amusement sounded slightly bitter now.

"Not an ex-wife. Just an ex."

"Hm." He heard her swallow again, suck in air over wet lips. "Wonder if my list will end up as long as yours."

"Of rules or exes?"

"I was thinking exes, but maybe both." He'd bet it was wine—and _damn it_ if armor coming off wasn't ten times as seductive as never having had it on in the first place.

"It's not an easy job, Kate, but don't take me as the average."

"Special Agent Gibbs, average?"

He smiled, pushed out a breath, quietly revealed his amusement.

Her tone was a little less tense when she spoke again. "Want to let me in on whether or not I'm coming over?"

He froze, then shifted his stance to make his pants a little more comfortable, stared out the window, swallowed. "Why would you come here?"

She laughed then, really laughed. "I was talking about the NCIS offices tomorrow. I didn't actually think that was on the table, too."

 _It shouldn't be._ "Do you want it to be? _Really_ want it to be?" His coffee was slowly losing warmth, and he downed several swallows.

"For someone who's been married multiple times, you are terrible at picking up on hints. Might explain all the exes."

He spoke slowly, tasting the words in his mouth. "Sometimes it's nice to hear it put explicitly. No chance of miscommunication. Safer for everyone. I never got why women hint at things."

She took several long gulps, and then a glass _clinked_ on a counter on the other side of the line. "Fair enough. Yes, I'd like for that to be on the table. But you know what? It shouldn't feel like pulling teeth to get it there."

His throat was dry. "I'm your future boss. I hope. Kinda makes it difficult."

"I haven't signed anything yet, Gibbs. Jethro." She sounded like she was threatening to shoot him. "On or off?"

He downed the rest of his coffee at once, running his tongue over his lips. "On."


	3. Chapter 3

Jethro met her at the door before she lifted a finger to the bell.  
She felt his gaze raking over her, tightening her skin, as she entered and unbuttoned her long coat. The way he paused to just look for a moment before shutting the door behind her made her duck her head and smile. _So this hadn't been a mistake._

Relaxing, she stood a little straighter, throwing her shoulders back to let the coat slide off a little more easily. And if that showed a little more cleavage, that certainly wasn't the point. His hands settled on her shoulders for a moment before he drew off the wool and hung it up.

She turned to find his eyes still on her, clear blue eyes that calmly proclaimed _I want_. She drew in a sharp breath, stepping closer as he shifted his weight, smiling slightly as he smoothed her hair around her face ran his thumbs down to her jawline.

 _What the hell was he waiting for?_ His lapels made a good point of leverage to pull him down to her.

Even his kiss was controlled, firm, _purposeful,_ and she would have been lying if she said she didn't curl one hand around the nape of his neck and press herself closer. He smelled like sweat and sawdust and he tasted like bourbon and coffee and something intoxicating when she darted her tongue over his lips.

She might've made some kind of sound when he opened his mouth a little wider and slipped his tongue between her own lips. He might have liked it, considering that he moved one hand to her lower back to draw her up against him, and something suspiciously like a mewl caught in her throat. No, _he definitely liked it_ if what she couldn't _not_ notice pressing against her abdomen was any indication.

She spread her hands underneath his shirt, teasing along the waistband of his pants with her ring and pinky fingers as she traced his abdominal muscles with her thumbs.

"God, Kate." Gibbs tilted his head to kiss her neck, which she couldn't help but arch in response. A step forwards from him backed them up against the wall, and he cushioned her head with the hand still tangled in her hair. "Can I call you Katie?"

She wanted to laugh, or moan; she wasn't sure which. "I hardly give a damn what you call me right now, Jethro." And she sunk her teeth gently into his shoulder by his neck over his shirt, to punctuate her point. He made some noise between a grunt and a growl, and let go of her head to begin untucking her blouse from her slacks.

Determined to give as good as she got, she began kissing his neck, unable to resist letting her teeth scrape when he began to unbutton her shirt. She felt him swallow under her tongue, and then he stepped back, taking a deep breath. "No hickeys."

She nodded, a few strands of hair falling in her eyes. "All right." Seeming somehow both brighter and darker, his eyes flicked between her face and the flushed skin revealed where he had opened her blouse.

She watched him watch her fumble with the rest of the buttons, balling his fists in his pockets. Her tongue flicked out to wet her bottom lip.

"Let me." He reached out again as she began to pull her arms out of the sleeves, sliding his hands over her shoulders and down her arms. Her skin prickled in their wake, and she ran her hands back under his shirt. Obliging her, he lifted his it over his head and dropped it to the floor to join her blouse.

His skin was warm and firm beneath her palms as she slid them up to his shoulders, biting her lip. "Is your bedroom somewhere around here?"

He swallowed, looking pensive for a moment before nodding. She toed one shoe off, an afterthought, and balanced a little unsteadily on one foot to remove the other. His amused smirk practically demanded a similar one in return, but she remained breathless when pressing her thighs together to steady herself made all the muscles in between clench.

He pulled her up to him for another kiss, and she stumbled into him as he took a step backwards away from the door, his breath hot and heavy on her cheek, jumbling her thoughts and her coordination.

When she nearly tripped on the carpet (over her own feet), he picked her up. She was perfectly content to spend the way to the bedroom with her legs wrapped around him, intimately aware of just how much he wanted this.

Rolling her hips against him was just too tempting, and he groaned and braced them up the hallway wall, pinning her with his gaze. "Keep doing that, Katie, and we won't make it to the bed."

"I'll behave." But she bit her lips and couldn't help shifting slightly as she spoke.

He searched her face for several moments, smirked, and shook his head. "No, you won't."

"Maybe." She tilted her head up to be kissed again, arching one eyebrow briefly as she smiled.

He set her down.

"What?" She tossed her hair over her shoulder with a flick of her head. _Way to make a woman feel wanted._ Even with both of them showing more skin than could ever be written off as an "accident" (or maybe still could be), she alternated between being sure he wanted her and wondering if this was some kind of pity thing (not that that would prevent a guy from enjoying it).

"I'm not gonna have sex with you up against the wall. Come on."

"I'm not some porcelain doll or Victorian princess. It's not like I'll break if I -" _"orgasm against something besides eight hundred thread count sheets?"_ _You really wanted to say that? To a guy who might end up as your boss-hardly will though, most likely, now._ She glanced down, pressing her lips together, exhaling through her nose.

He leaned a little closer, and she was slightly distracted by the way his skin shifted over flexing muscles when he laid his forearm against the wall beside her, boxing her in, blue gaze piercing. "You said yourself I don't do things halfway, and I fully intend to make love to you properly."

She caught her breath, her panties damp against suddenly sensitized skin.

"Are you coming, Katie?"

Slightly dazed, she nodded and followed.

* * *

 **A.N.: I love him calling her "Katie," but I haven't noticed any solid basis for that in canon, so... I'm making my own.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A.N.: Warning for smut. This is the only such chapter in this fic, and is not absolutely necessary to understand the rest of the story, so feel free to skip it** **—** **or, rather, please do, if you're officially too young to be reading this sort of thing.**

* * *

She was gorgeous, with little wisps of hair falling in her face, her bottom lip pink from her teeth and maybe his, and the way she looked at him as if he was the answer to her prayers.

He shed his socks and pants quickly, relieved to be rid of the restrictive fabric. Kate copied him, shaking her slacks off her right foot, and he almost wished she would have taken her time, but complaining was not on his mind.

Her utilitarian blue panties did not match the white bra trimmed with only a little lace, but the fact that she obviously hadn't planned for this—he liked it. When she finally stood in front of him again, he dipped his head to draw her top lip between his, and he couldn't resist letting her lightly feel his teeth. She kissed like she fought, holding nothing back from the start, and she tasted like sweet liquor and strawberry chapstick, heady and feminine and something he would be happy to run his tongue over all night.

The moan as he drew back was quiet. "Jethro-" The muscles of her throat flexed under his lips as she swallowed.

"Are you—" He knelt, nuzzling her stomach, running his hands down her sides. Soft skin hid toned muscles and he was looking forward to sparring with her.

"—going to—" He inhaled deeply, gently pushing her thighs apart, his fingers grazing her through the cloth.

Her breath hitched, and she sat back on the bed, letting her legs fall open.

Eagerly, she helped him remove her panties, the obvious damp spot on the cotton doing things to his head, his erection, his ego... He kissed the inside of her right thigh, smiling to himself as her eyelids fluttered.

" _God_ , Katie." The slick warmth he found as he trailed two fingers gently between her folds made his cock twitch. "Did I…did I do that to you?"

Her hips bucked as he traced the same path again. Red tinted her cheeks.

"Mmmhm." Katie—his Katie, Kate was hardly intimate enough for what they were doing—leaned back on her elbows, nodding as she closed her eyes, running her tongue over her lips again, and he attempted to memorize a once-in-a-lifetime view (except for the lucky guy she ended up with, a guy that wouldn't be her boss, fuck that guy).

She tilted her hips towards him as he slid one finger into her, then two, breathless at the feel of the silky heat.

"So wet." His voice sounded rough in his own ears as he fought unsuccessfully to keep from imagining the muscles currently flexing around his fingers caressing his cock. To distract himself, he pressed his open mouth to her, lightly tracing random patterns through her folds with his tongue, tasting a liquid salty and savory and addicting. She whimpered, and he set about pleasuring her in earnest.

* * *

"Jethro—Gibbs—stop." She was gasping her breaths, her mouth open, eyes closed, still shuddering with the aftershocks of her orgasm.

Reluctantly, he sat back, sliding his fingers out of her slowly, smoothly, and swallowing the taste of her on his tongue. "Everything all right?"

"Are you kidding me? _Fuck_..." She smiled, the glaze over her eyes slowly fading as she focused on him, bright and warm and open. "Better than all right. I just—" She swallowed, took a gulp of air. "I just need a minute."

He nodded, slowly, unable to keep a smile off his face even if he had wanted to. He had watched—felt—her come apart twice now, noticed the tension disappear, heard her grow gradually louder and throatier as she let go. That was a sensation he would never not enjoy.

"Come up here." He was happy to obey, though the erection he had been able to ignore made itself uncomfortably known again, and he felt clumsy as he rose a little more slowly than he would have a few decades ago. She was sprawled back on his duvet, an angel with a dark halo, and making it harder for him to breathe as she drew off her bra and let it fall beside the bed.

He reached out, almost reverently, to run his fingers over nipples that hardened under his touch. She shivered slightly, and then suddenly her nimble fingers were pulling down his boxers and wrapping around his cock, and he let out a strangled groan.

She grinned, rolling on to her side and then dipping her head down. Her tongue and then her lips made his cock leap and pulse, and he groaned, louder. "Kate. Katie." He twisted one fist in her hair. "Some other—not now." He wouldn't promise her some other time, no matter how much he wanted to.

She glanced up at him, a siren's smile on her lips, her innocent wide eyes glinting with mischief. "Why not?"

A pink tongue ran along her lower lip, one eyebrow twitched upwards, and he almost gave in to whatever glorious thing she wanted to subject him to.

Admitting that he wasn't twenty with a recovery time of approximately as many minutes any more was not something he wanted to do right now, so he shifted away and fumbled in the nightstand drawer. "I really want to be inside you."

Hardly eloquent, but her eyes brightened, her smile softened, and she sat up to set her hands on his chest, run them over his shoulders.

He swallowed. _Thank God_ the thing hadn't expired yet—even if it wasn't that far off.

"Should I do it?" Her voice was quiet, pleased.

He shook his head, tearing the condom wrapper open and rolling it on in one hasty motion.

Katie didn't hesitate to sink down on him, and he wasn't sure if the moan he heard was hers or his or both. She took a moment adjust, and then set an eager rhythm.

Closing his eyes, he dipped his head to close his lips over one nipple, flicking it with his tongue, and relished her whimper and the feeling of her muscles beginning to flutter around him.

* * *

"Just—" she swallowed, rolling over limply to lay her forehead on her arm, the movement muffling her voice and her heaving breaths. "Just gimme a minute or two longer. Then I'll—I'll get up and—"

"It's late." His voice was gruff in his ears as he pulled the rubber off. "You can go home and change tomorrow morning." He was willing to bet she would be drowsy in a few minutes, and she should not be trying to drive like that (and maybe he didn't really give a shit about whether or not keeping her around was a good idea right now).

"Are you sure?" She turned her head slightly to the side, her face hidden behind her hair. He leaned up on one elbow, and carefully tucked the strands behind her ear with his free hand to reveal hesitant eyes and teeth digging into her lower lip.

"I'm sure. There should be extra toothbrushes in the medicine cabinet if you want to use one."

"Thanks."

She burrowed under the covers and watched as he swung his legs over the side and headed to the bathroom himself to clean up.

Kate was asleep, or almost, when he returned to lay next to her, but she still shifted to nestle her head on his shoulder with a sigh of contentment.

He gently rested an arm over her side, to draw her in closer, and slept better than he had in months.


	5. Chapter 5

She rolled over lazily, opening her eyes to find herself alone in a bed that wasn't hers.

A split second was all it took for the delicious memories to return, and she wouldn't bring herself to regret it, but she couldn't deny that she was nervous, now, either.

Her clothes—blouse included—were draped over the towel rack, and a bath towel sat folded to the side of the sink. She didn't use it, but rinsing her mouth out, washing her face, and finger-combing her hair went a long way towards making her feel like a less obvious participant in the walk of shame.

She found Jethro Gibbs in the kitchen by following the whirr of the coffee maker. One steaming mug sat on the counter, with a second currently being filled.

"Morning." He turned around, lifting the second off the coffee maker to his lips.

"Morning, Kate. Sleep well?"

She nodded. "And you?"

"Yeah, I slept well. Help yourself." Their gazes stayed locked as she reached for one of the mugs. One sip, though, had her sputtering. "What kind of poison is this?!"

He grinned. "Never had coffee the Marine way before?"

"No! And I don't intend to ever again!"

"I might have some milk and sugar somewhere around here."

His cupboards and fridge were fairly sparse, occupied by only the basics, but she was able to make her drink palatable.

"I don't have much I could offer for breakfast."

"I was just going to head home anyways." She squared her shoulders. "Will my name still be at the gate at fifteen hundred zulu today?"

He eyed her over the rim of his mug, licking his lips as he lowered it. "Might be kind of hard. There is a certain policy against fraternization. People might think it kind of funny I hired you after sleeping with you. And it ain't easy to take orders from someone you've seen naked."

"Maybe for you but not for me. Do you think me having slept with you would diminish my respect for how well you do your job?" She wouldn't say _you did my job, never mind your own, better than me and everyone else doing my job_ , but then she hardly needed to. "I would hope you wouldn't lose your ability to give me orders just because you've seen me naked."

He grinned. She realized a split second later just how it sounded. "I don't mean that I _like_ you trying to order me around—"

His grin widened for a moment before it faded altogether. "And the other?"

"Are _you_ planning on telling anyone?"

"Nope. But you sure you want to start a new job like this?"

"Do you think my new boss would mind?" She tilted her head to the side and drained the last of her morning dose of caffeine.

He shook his head slowly. "Heard he refuses to sleep with coworkers, though."

"Heard he already did, once." Arching an eyebrow at him, she moved to rinse her mug out in the sink.

He turned to face her, setting his mug underneath the nozzle and stabbing at the coffee maker again, with more force than was necessary. "Kate. I mean it. Last night can't happen again if you're working for me."

"I'm hardly going to throw myself at someone who obviously isn't interested, Jethro." Opening the ancient dishwasher and sliding out the top rack for her to deposit her mug seemed to take all his attention. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to smirk or shoot him. "And I can be professional."

He spoke a little heavily, to her hearing. "My agents call me Gibbs. Not Jethro."

"I will be your agent starting when my signature is on those papers and not before."

She followed his pointed glance towards the glowing numbers on the microwave. "You might want to get going if you want to make it back to your place, shower and change and all before that ten o'clock appointment."

"Right." She began to close the dishwasher, waited for him to seemingly down the entire steaming mug in one gulp and set his mug inside, then shut it the rest of the way. The _click_ of the machine's door latch sounded strangely loud.

His hand on her arm stopped her mid-stride, and he gave her one last, thorough taste of his coffee-flavored lips before he picked up his keys and left.

* * *

 **A.N.: I need to make some mild revisions (though I admittedly don't have the patience to go through multiple drafts or any such thing) but I'll try to post a chapter or two each day, maybe more if I get them done quickly enough.**


	6. Chapter 6

She stayed a little wary until the notary had stamped the papers and her Sig Sauer and temporary badge were clipped on her belt.

Her current firearms qualification and her basic Criminal Investigations training from the Secret Service (even if that was _really_ rusty) let her skip most of the "new agent" seminars and procedures, but she still didn't see her actual team for a week, not even to deliver her own (exemplary) progress reports, not before she was issued her actual badge, and she didn't dare contact Jethro. If he really wanted something, he would go after it, after all—she didn't doubt that for a second—and she wondered, once, if she had pushed too far already.

To say she was surprised to to see _DiNozzo's cell_ on her phone screen at two in the morning was an understatement. "Tony, you better have a damn good reason for calling at this hour."

Her stomach twisted when she recognized her boss' voice, a little gruffer than she remembered. "Any reason that would make him wake _you_ up is a good reason. Playtime's over. We have a crime scene."

It was all she could do to force her still-drowsy brain to memorize the address as he rattled it off without giving her time to look for something to write with. And then he hung up.

She was expecting him to chew her out for being late to the scene, too, but Tony explained for her and Jethro—Gibbs—her boss didn't seem to have been annoyed in the first place as he handed her the boots and walked ahead of her to the NCIS truck.

"Put your hair up. Why'd you do it up like—that—" he gestured to where she'd pulled her hair away from her face with a simple barrette in the back "—in the first place?"

"Unlike most females associated with the military, I have a very low tolerance for feeling like my hair is being pulled out of my scalp." She'd heard multiple women soldiers complaining about the tight buns they had to pull their hair back into to pass inspection, and it was never a style that had appealed to her.

He raised his eyebrows, giving her a pointed look as his tongue darted out to wet his bottom lip. "How about for your DNA ending up with evidence?"

She unclipped her barrette, slipping it into her pocket and pushing back her sleeve to show him the hairband on her wrist. "I've got it covered. Relax."

He exhaled slowly, closing his eyes for a moment. "I'm just afraid I'll mess up, or miss something, or let some mistake you make slip." He spoke quietly.

She wasn't even sure he intended for her to hear it, but as she tied her ponytail and tucked it up under her cap, re-using the bobby pins from her previous style to better secure it, she tried to catch his gaze. "You're the best investigator and field agent I've ever run across. I wouldn't have taken this job if I didn't think we could work together—work well together. Are we clear? Special Agent Gibbs?"

She continued to watch him as she bent down to lace up the combat boots. Finally, he nodded.

"Thanks, Ka-te." He stumbled slightly, as if swallowing an extra syllable.

She nodded quietly. "What's the deal with this guy impaling the SUV? Whose SUV is it?"

* * *

The thought crossed her mind, later, that he had foisted her off on Abby to get her away from him, or just to get her out of the field, but getting a front seat to forensics was more than worth it.

"Do you work with Gibbs a lot?" She strung one of the shroud lines over the mass inspection frame they had jury-rigged as she spoke.

"He doesn't trust anyone else to do his forensics." Abby's pride shone through in her voice. "You ever get a tattoo?"

"Nope. I thought about it a few times, though." Kate grinned. "Does the collar ever get uncomfortable?" It was almost a sort of a game: question, answer, then the other girl's turn.

"I kinda feel naked without it." Abby's voice dipped mischievously. "Ever thought about doing it with a girl?"

"It?" Kate arched an eyebrow. "I'm Catholic."

"So am I. New Orleans born and raised. Besides, fornication's technically a sin, too, and I _know_ that's not exactly something you care too much about."

(One Kate confessed more often than she would have liked to admit. She was always grateful when the priest was lax and didn't ask if she was sorry for her sins.)

She let out a little half-laugh and dipped her head. "Fair enough. No, I've never seriously thought about it. So do you like spicy food?"

"It's the only stuff I'll eat. Do you have a thing for Gibbs?"

Kate fumbled with the shroud line she was currently tying. "What?" Noticing her voice had risen in pitch, she winced internally.

"I asked if you liked Gibbs." Abby tilted her head, looking at her. Kate felt her teeth digging into her lower lip, and made herself stop, attempting a smile instead.

"I think we get along okay." She lifted one shoulder. "He's a great investigator. Do you have any pets?"

Abby eyed her a moment longer before turning to work on her side of the shroud lines, keeping them from getting tangled. "Nope. My building manager won't allow any. You?"

* * *

They made a good team, she and Gibbs, she thought.

She could play the serious, straight-laced foil to his innate (rule-ignoring) hard-ass, or the ignorant innocent to his all-knowing accuser, better than she might like to admit. She wasn't comfortable enough around him to have any body language that would have given her away, the threat of eternal torment at DiNozzo's mercy enough to have her extra-alert in that department anyways. Both she and Gibbs were too passionate about their work to let anything significantly distract them.

She was tempted to call him and tell him-celebrate-that they were going to be fine. But she was willing to bet even his new phone was useless for reaching him right now due to ex-wife number three.

And since a one-night stand (and an ongoing _damn I want another_ thing) probably qualified her, technically, she belonged on the list of his exes now, too.


	7. Chapter 7

He glanced at the woman sitting at the desk beside him. The bullpen was dark, and mostly deserted. The case was closed. She had already handed in her report.

"Don't you want to go home, Kate?"

"What the hell, Gibbs?" Her tone was quiet, but she looked up, and stared straight at him, tucking a few locks of hair behind her ear.

"Pardon me?" He raised his eyebrows slightly, meeting her gaze.

"'You might want to rethink your definition of the word friend?' It's more Marcy who should rethink hers. It was out of line for me to even _ask_ her to go behind her boss' back, and you know it. And then to tell me 'I _disappoint_ you' because she did her job?" There might have been a slight waver in her voice, but her back was straight as she leaned forward, setting her elbows on the edge of her desk.

He shifted his jaw, schooling his features to make sure his surprise at the sudden introduction of the topic didn't show. "It wasn't the FBI's or anyone else's case to muscle in on."

"We probably wouldn't have solved this case without the FBI'S help, not in time. It wouldn't hurt you to learn how to cooperate with other agencies. I know you're capable of it. We did fine with the DEA."

He lifted one shoulder. "You weren't too keen on sharing jurisdiction, either, when it was up to you."

"But I did what was best for the case and let other people do their jobs." She was calm, controlled, but a fierceness hid in her eyes that did strange things to him—things like wanting to rile her up more often, or close the distance between them.

"So did I."

She shook her head. "No, you didn't, but that's not even the point. The _point_ is that it was an unreasonable request to make. I tried anyways. But you shouldn't have asked, and you don't get to blame me or make that sort of personal attack when things don't go the way you want."

"Kate…" He sighed. "I'm not going to apologize."

"Of course you're not." She turned, taking a moment to shut off the computer. "Just make sure it doesn't happen again."

He frowned, watching as she stood, slung her coat over her shoulders. "Sometimes what you have to do isn't all that _reasonable_ to other people. I need to know—"

"I followed your orders. I will continue to follow them. But you need to give a little more thought to those orders next time, ask yourself exactly how necessary this kind of shit is. It wouldn't have changed anything, or hurt anything, for me to just have given her the serial numbers, without asking for her to deceive her boss and neglect to do her job thoroughly." Her words were clipped as she pushed her chair in and picked up her purse.

 _You didn't have to do it_ would have been a lie. He would have been really pissed if he had found out. Her _I won't disobey a direct order_ rang in his head, too—even if it hadn't been direct, he had been clear about exactly what he wanted.

"Fornell can be a real ass." It was muttered, for lack of something else to say.

"He is. I hate the guy, too. But what happened to interpersonal relationships not getting in the way of our jobs?"

He watched as she made her way to the elevators, without looking back.


	8. Chapter 8

The number on his phone was one he knew better than he might have really liked. He seemed to have memorized it just by punching it in to put it on his speed dial.

"Gibbs."

"Again, what the hell?" Her tone wasn't actually all that irritated.

He set down his sanding block on the table with a little more force than might have been necessary. "What is it this time, Kate?"

"Why do you encourage him?"

"Encourage who in what?" His words were crisp.

"DiNozzo. The bathing suit. Is any of this ringing a bell?"

"What about it?" The floppy hat was ugly as all hell—still might've been cute on her, though—but he'd seen Kate topless before and maybe it had torn up his mental filters a little bit.

"'Any chance you're going to try that on?' I'm pretty sure that would qualify as sexual harassment. As well as Tony's 'gift'." Her tone was still even.

"All right. I shouldn't have said it." He swallowed. "Happy now?"

She blew out a breath. "It's a start. It would be nice if you could rein him in some more."

"Getting thin skin, Kate?"

"No, but half of the things he says do not belong in the workplace and you know it. I would have thought you'd care for discipline a little more, Gunnery Sergeant."

He could hear the slight challenge in her voice, and the corners of his mouth twitched upward involuntarily. "Do you like discipline, Agent Todd?"

"I find it useful. It makes things efficient."

"See, I never found it efficient to waste time talking about things that aren't pertinent to a case."

"Do you want me to gag him so he can't talk at all? Or go to HR instead?"

"You sure don't pull your punches. Not sure he'd actually mind being gagged by you, though." A pause, then: "You gonna sic HR on me, too?"

"Probably not. No, I'm not." She let out a wry, breathy half-laugh. "You're the one who wanted to stay away from me, Gibbs. Jethro."

A slight pause filled with silence. He swallowed, hesitant to analyze precisely why he liked hearing her use his given name.

"But I don't want to show any kind of double standard, either. If anything, comments from my boss would even more out-of-line than comments from a coworker."

"Right." He dipped his head, nodding slightly, though she obviously couldn't see him.

"Figured my boss was the right person to go to with this sort of thing." It was matter-of-fact, as if she was outlining the circumstances of a case.

"He probably is." He swallowed, again. "Sure he appreciates it."

"Good night, Gibbs."

He flipped his phone shut without replying, letting his eyes close and several moments pass before he picked up the sanding block again.


	9. Chapter 9

In retrospect, she was glad she hadn't called him after that first case.

He barely talked to her when it wasn't about a case. She was still friendly, still tried to joke, but most of the time he earned the second "b" in his name.

Despite having told her this wasn't the kind of job where she was supposed to agree with everything he said, he sure liked giving orders, and most of the time she felt like a glorified secretary, or a plain old minion to the (maybe not quite evil) boss. Theories besides his own took second priority.

He made them work through the night and then stole her coffee in the morning. She expected her would replace it over the course of the day, and when she fully realized that wasn't about to happen, she had already gotten herself another cup and gotten over it. (It unnerved her a little how easily that had happened.)

He sent her to work half of her second crime scene without supervision, and even though she was confident she could do it, and she knew she would have to be cut loose at some point, and of course she wasn't going to admit she might like help… both of them knew she had done exceedingly well when she managed the entire laundry list he had given her, to Gibbs' satisfaction, by herself.  
Maybe she was a little grateful to him afterwards, to know he had that kind of confidence in her.

He never enforced discipline but still expected excellence, and sometimes mind-reading abilities. Tony messed around, did whatever the hell he wanted, but she was apparently supposed to ignore it and give her report professionally.  
(Really, it shouldn't have been a big deal. It was basic work discipline. She was slightly appalled to recognize exactly how much she had "gone native" in such a short time.  
At least Tony seemed to have toned his teasing and comments down a little recently, which made them easier to ignore.)

Maybe she was a bit of an ass, too, when she pulled the "Is it just the females you do this to?" card, but she could hardly say "Are you riding me hard just because we slept together?" in the middle of the bullpen. He didn't give any good answer to the question he knew she was really asking.

He went on his gut, taking chances that never should have panned out—betting that the nearby power line towers were the target of the terrorist attack, for instance, based on a hunch. She wanted whatever lucky charm he kept in his pocket.  
When she went on her "gut"—not even on her gut, on her knowledge of Catholic culture and on her profiler training and putting that together with the evidence presented—she was "letting personal situations color her judgement".

Her boss was a bastard, and sometimes she hated herself for staying.

* * *

But the high at the end made it all worth it-and like it or not, Gibbs' methods secured that high. He had the highest closure rate out of everyone at the office, and maybe out of all of NCIS.

Erin Toner's confession came through loud and clear to the observation room as Gibbs wrote down her official statement. Kate listened, watched, still attentive for signs of lying or fabrication but no longer on high alert, endorphins flooding her system.

She glanced up at the sound of the door opening, and nodded to Abby as she slipped in to the room. "How's it going?"

"They're almost done." She kept her voice quiet. "She's even admitting to killing Martinez, thanks to that fake fingerprint match. Says he killed the lieutenant commander. I'm not so sure about that, but at least she's clearing his name. That's what matters."

"You did really good today, Kate. I mean, we all did." Abby shoved her hands into her lab coat pockets, letting her thumbs hang out, seeming more grounded than usual for the moment. "But nobody cared like you did about his family, or clearing his name. Putting the bad guys away is only half of justice. We forget that around here sometimes."

"You all care, Abs. Ducky still treats the victims like people. Gibbs will do anything to get a bad guy off the streets. You're in the lab at all hours of the night, whenever we need something. DiNozzo…" She smirked, then exhaled. "He's not heartless, either."

Abby just nodded, watching Gibbs and Toner through the glass for a moment. Toner lifted her chin, narrowed her eyes when Gibbs asked for some specifics on Martinez's murder, but her body language seemed truthful.

"So, me and a couple of friends had plans to go out tonight. You want to come with us? Celebrate a bit?"

"Yeah. I'd like that." She offered Abby a genuine if still slightly shy smile, and Abby glanced at her and returned a decidedly more rambunctious one.

"Cool. You want to come and grab me from the lab when you're done in here, and we can head out together?"

"Sure. Sounds like a plan. I'm not really dressed up for going out, though… especially not with your crowd."

"I'm sure I can find something in my locker for you, if you want." Mischievous should have been Abby's middle name, or at least one of them. "I'd love to see how Gibbs reacts to you in some of my stuff…"

"What? Why?" Kate did her best not to act nervous, keeping her posture relaxed, folding her arms across her chest, but her gaze was pulled away from the pair in interrogation.

Abby had several corsets, and low-cut T-shirts—too large for Kate, the neckline too low on someone her size—and miniskirts, and maybe she would really like to see his reaction, just not in front of Abby.

"Because. It's just so—not you. It would throw him off. It would be funny."

"Great." Kate gave a tiny, disbelieving shake of her head. "I think I'll just go home and change, if you don't mind."

"You might want to pick out something that's not Secret Service casual this time." Abby's joking tone softened the jab.

"I was planning to." She was not keen on embarrassing herself with Abby's crowd again.

"Cool. I'll see you, then."

Kate turned her full attention back to Toner and Gibbs, smiling to herself, as Abby ducked back out.

* * *

"You _so_ wanted Gibbs to see you in my stuff, Kate, admit it! It was in your eyes." Abby set her chin on her fists, her elbows propped up on the table.

"Gibbs is her boss, isn't he?" Benji looked even more stereotypically goth than Abby, complete with guyliner and spiky black hair to complement all the leather and chains—except for his dark skin.

"Yup." Abby grinned.

"You're just trying to embarrass me again, aren't you, Abs?" Kate took a sip of her third—or was it fourth?—beer of the night.

Sara raised her head from Benji's shoulder, to grin smugly at Kate. "So how is he?"

"What?" She swallowed quickly to avoid spitting her drink across the table.

"How is he? As a boyfriend? In bed?" Sara's blonde hair, lack of makeup, and propensity towards white dresses belied her devilish personality.

"He's—" She remembered just in time that she worked with Abby, and Abby knew Gibbs well, and she was one of the people who _really_ shouldn't know, and damn the alcohol for almost making her forget it. "Gibbs is really strict about not dating coworkers."

"Then you just have to show him why he should change his mind." Sara lifted one shoulder nonchalantly.

Abby tilted her head, regarding Kate, appraising."You'd be good for him, Kate. But I swear, if you break his heart I might have to—" She shook her head. "I don't know what I'd do. Something really bad."

Sara laughed. "You're too sweet to make threats properly."

"I'm hardly going to throw myself at my boss!" Kate took a long drink, again. "Or try to seduce him."

"But you'd like to."

That drew a wry laugh from her. "If I say yes, can we move on?"

"Only if it's the truth." Sara grinned.

Kate exhaled, offering them a small smile. "Yeah. It is." She pulled on the hem of her cowlneck red top self-consciously, swearing to herself never to go out with Abby and her friends again. At least until after she had had some time to recover.

"So do you have any tattoos, Kate?" She returned Benji's quiet smile with a somewhat broader one. As the designated driver for the night, he was the only one who could be called sober at the moment.

"What is it with you guys and tattoos?"

Benji raised his eyebrows. "It's art. It's a form of self-expression, maybe the most significant kind because it's on your body and you'll have it forever."

"Oh, no, don't get me wrong, I think it's cool. It's just—that was one of the first questions Abby asked me, too."

Benji lifted his Sara-less shoulder a little. "It makes a pretty good icebreaker. It's pretty likely the other person has some body art, too. At least in our circles."

"I guess so. Well, like I told Abby, I've thought about it, but I never actually went through with it."

"Why not?"

She couldn't come up with anything that seemed like a good reason. "I even had a design picked out for ages."

Sara's slow smirk mirrored Abby's. "Well, what are you waiting for?"


	10. Chapter 10

She had been almost certain he was going to kiss her.

She knew she was riding high on a whirlwind, internally. Apprehension of Gibbs without his morning coffee. Fury that he was going to leave her ashore just because she was female. Relief when that wasn't the case. Excitement that she was going to be on a nuclear submarine. Frustration when none of the candidates seemed like likely candidate. Stress because she just knew—and Gibbs knew, too, by the way he was pacing—that something was going to go down and they were running out of time.

The setting was practically intimate, more so even than when they had been bunking in the same room on the Foster. Space on the submarine was scarce. They had been confined, essentially, to one room, for hours on end, with no one but each other and occasionally the seamen for company.

He was almost gentler there, without DiNozzo or other company around, a little more open. He told her about his "profile training" and his suspicions, didn't seem to mind when she had no idea what a "cob" was supposed to refer to, made her complicit in his scheme to slip around the skipper's supervision.  
She felt like his partner, not his minion, almost as if they were on Air Force One (except she could help with the investigation proper this time).

You could even say he was almost flirting, with that little grin as he whispered "busted", the hand on her hip as he shooed her out to the head, that cocky smile that accompanied "I like to think it's me", even if they were both all too aware that the case was far too important to let any other thoughts creep into their heads.

It was almost like someone wanted to force the issue, and so, for reasons not at all under her control, or his, she found herself pressed up against him, closer than they'd maybe ever been.

She also found herself with an almost alarming desire to shoot the COB when he slipped into the cabin and leaned against the door.

* * *

"He told him he got a tat on his ass."

With a small smile, Gibbs stepped back and returned to his desk. She stared at the scene for a split second longer—McGee disappearing into the elevator, Tony staring after him, a little slack-jawed.

"Do you think it's true?"

"He wouldn't be the first to fall under Abby's influence, now would he, Kate?"

She turned to face him, hoped—though she knew it was futile—that her surprise wouldn't show as she closed her mouth and purposely narrowed her eyes.

"You sat lopsided for two days." He grinned.

She glanced down, sure her cheeks were slowly turning pink now.

Tony's footsteps were quiet on the bullpen carpet. "Hey guys, did you know McGee got a tattoo on his ass? Of the word 'Mom'?"

"What makes you think he was telling you the truth, DiNozzo? More importantly, why do you think I should care?" Gibbs didn't take his eyes off her as he spoke.

"Uh, no reason, boss. Sorry." She was sure the look on her coworker's face was highly amusing, but she didn't want to turn around just yet, make him wonder why her cheeks were flushed or why she was breathing a little faster under their boss' gaze.

"Go see if Ducky has his final report on Petty Officer Drew's autopsy finished yet."

"Sure, boss. On it."

She waited for Tony to retreat before she turned to sit back at her desk.

"What is it?"

She stopped, turning to glance at him out of the corners of her eyes. "What?"

He set one elbow on his desk and leaned forward a little, his gaze still focused on her. "What kind of a tattoo does Caitlin Todd get on her ass?"

"That's hardly a work-appropriate question, Gibbs." She lowered her voice to almost a whisper, her insides quivering as she noticed the light in his eyes, though she consciously squared her shoulders.

He arched one eyebrow, briefly, maybe in acquiescence to her point. But he still waited silently, expectantly. She stared at him, unsure whether he wanted her to be intimidated or just confused.

She had done her best to adhere to his rules, and remind him to adhere to them, but since he didn't seem to really give a damn, she was hardly going to stand in his way.

"Everything necessary has already been recorded in my file. And I don't ink and tell."

She shot him a wide smile as she sat back down at her desk. "I might show you, though. Under the right circumstances."

His slow blink and the way he swallowed as he turned his attention back to the reports on his desk were incredibly gratifying.

* * *

 **A.N.: I try not to repeat stuff from the show, but... Sub Rosa. *hearteyes* No way was I going to pass up dwelling on that emergency blow moment just a little bit.**


	11. Chapter 11

Kate blinked and flipped open her cell phone. "New case, Gibbs?"

"Nope."

Shifting the device from one ear to the other, she set down her sketchpad and pulled the comforter up a little more over her pajama-covered torso. "All right… what's this about?"

His voice was almost strained as he spoke. "You shouldn't say stuff like you did today, Katie."

"You started it." It was easy to say, and true.

" _I_ started—" He stopped in the middle of his protest, and she heard his slow inhale and exhale.

"Gibbs." She swallowed, herself. "Jethro. I don't—I have no intentions of playing the seductress. But it doesn't have to be like this."

There was a pause, and then: "Why'd you resign from the Secret Service, and then still take the job here, Kate?"

Frank honesty was an easy decision. "It was the right thing to do, but I also resigned because I didn't want to get fired. Once it got out that I had been seeing Major Kerry..." She didn't even bother finishing the sentence.

"But in the Secret Service, my job was to protect the president. My attention would have been divided when I was on duty with Tim, and in a life-or-death situation... Here, I figured it wouldn't be the worst thing to protect my fellow agents first and foremost."

"Is your attention divided here?" he barked.

"While we're on a case? Hardly. I can investigate just fine alongside someone I've slept with." She sat up a little more in the bed, almost insulted."Unlike, DiNozzo, I can control my libido. Is your attention divided?"

"Of course not."

She believed him. This was the legendary Special Agent Gibbs, after all.

"Then where is the problem? We work fine together. We can inform HR about the situation, if you want to be completely upfront about it. Are you going to start showing me some kind of partiality at work?"

"No." He sounded almost annoyed now. _Good._ Now he knew how it felt.

"Then what is your problem with seeing me?" She exhaled, loudly. "You know what? Forget it. I'm not going to try to drag you someplace you obviously don't want to go. But then stop making me think you want to go there."

"I'll be there in fifteen minutes." He hung up abruptly, leaving her with her mouth open and her heart racing.

 _Damn infuriating man._ Well, she wasn't going to change clothes for him.

She did, however, deign to meet him at the door, even if he did already have a key.

He leaned down to kiss her the moment she opened the door, wrapping his arms around her. It was almost impossible not to melt, but she managed to not completely dissolve into a puddle at his feet.

She pulled away after a moment, setting a hand on his chest, the taste of bourbon bitter on his lips and hers. "Come in and close the door."

"I'm pretty damn terrible at relationships, Katie." It was low, and dark, with a dangerous amount of conviction.

"I figured. You hate to compromise and you're not used to thinking of anyone besides yourself on a personal level anymore." She turned back towards her bedroom, unbuttoning her top, and asked off-handedly, "Do you want anything to drink?"

"Not really, no." He paused, then came: "What do you mean, 'anymore'?"

She bit her lip, stopped walking, turned to look at him. "I imagine you were quite considerate towards your first wife and daughter—as much as is possible in the Marine Corps, but then you were going to retire, weren't you?"

His hand was on her shoulder, hot against her bare skin where the top had begun to slip off, and then he jerked it away as if he had been scalded.

His narrowed, storm-filled eyes flicked between her face and her partially bared chest, before she self-consciously fastened one of the top buttons again, and he turned his head away, swallowing.

"You think the Secret Service didn't go over your file and anything else we could get our hands on with a fine-toothed comb before we let you on Air Force One?"

She stood a step back to give him space and the wall was hard at her back. Straightening, she splayed her fingers over the smooth surface of the striped wallpaper she had never gotten around to replacing when she had moved in, almost bracing herself against it.

"I'm sorry. I never meant to bring it up before you did. If you ever did." She spoke softly.

He swallowed again, nodding. "I think I'll take that drink. Do you have any bourbon?"

"I can start stocking it." Her buttons didn't quite match up, and she had to undo the hastily fastened one from earlier, attempting to keep her voice steady. "Would cognac do for now?"

"Didn't peg you for the hard liquor type at all." His voice was low behind her as she pulled a glass out of the cabinet.

"Usually I'm not. But I kept some around for Tim."

On second thought, she got out another glass for herself. The bottle was already open from several weeks ago, when she had had a drink or two (and then been fucked senseless and spent the night at her future boss' house).

He downed half of the generous portion she gave him in one gulp, and leaned on the counter with one hand. "Thanks."

She nodded, filling the other glass with water for herself, watching him. "You're welcome."

"I wasn't expecting..."

"Of course not. I didn't mean to bring it up."

"You didn't really." He took a deep breath. "Why'd you ask me how many exes I had?"

"When did I do that?" She took a sip, trying to recall the conversation.

"First time we talked on the phone. You asked me how many ex-wives I'd had."

She was surprised he remembered, but then she really shouldn't have been. "I wanted to see what you'd tell me. Which was exactly nothing, as I recall."

"I'm not exactly a chatty person."

"No, really?" She offered him a smile to soften the nip of sarcasm. He returned a small one.

They both drank in silence, him sipping his liquor as she gulped her water, and then he set down his glass.

She took a deep breath and set hers down, too. "I'll try not to pry. I would have preferred to hear about everything from you—I still would like to hear it from you, whenever you're ready—but I can't un-know something."

He lifted one shoulder. "Makes things a little easier. I don't have to worry you don't really know who you're looking at."

"No, you don't."

It was a stupid decision, maybe, if she actually thought about it. But his lips on hers were soft and surprisingly gentle, and she didn't really care.


	12. Chapter 12

**A.N.: A bit of fluff after all the angst. Obligatory "what is Kate's tattoo and how does Gibbs know about it" scene.**

* * *

He ought to feel guilty, he felt. But he was still riding the high of release—he must have been, since all he actually felt was surprisingly light.

Kate's head was on his chest again, her breasts pressed up against his side, devoid of clothes—and wasn't that a glorious sight?—and her little pants were slowly subsiding.

She pressed a kiss to his chest, smiling—then he did feel a pang of guilt, which he hated more than he thought he should, and he pushed it away and sat up.

"Roll over, Kate. Katie." He pulled his legs up underneath himself and turned to face her properly, dropping a kiss on her cheek.

"We're off-duty. I don't have to follow your orders right now." She shot him a grin, her features soft with affection and pleasure.

"You did promise to show me your tattoo." He spoke slowly, savoring the way she held his gaze.

Her cheeks colored slightly. "I said I might."

Still, she dropped her eyes after a moment and rolled onto her stomach, burying her face in one of the many large pillows occupying her bed, kicking her feet so the covers slid down.

He drew the covers down, eyeing the patch of dark ink on her right cheek. He had to chuckle, reaching out to trace over the gray lines. Something with a fluffy tail and large ears was curled up as if to sleep, though its eyes were open and it sported a distinctly cheeky grin. Behind it, a heart was traced, with an autonomous pencil finishing the last touches of the sketch.

"It's cute. What is it?"

"Fennec fox." Her voice was muffled. "I drew them a lot when I was younger. I thought they were the cutest things in the world."

He laughed, leaning down to kiss the back of her neck as he laid his palm over the image and squeezed gently.

She let out a hum and buried her face deeper in the pillow as he let his fingers drift down between her legs.


	13. Chapter 13

She forced herself to limit happy glances towards her boss to once every ten minutes, and then she finally got into a focused work rhythm where her mind didn't jump to him beside her in bed every five seconds and prompt a stupid giddy smile she would have to suppress.

He wasn't immune himself, though, and she caught him staring at her once or twice, and then she quickly ducked her head and hoped Tony wasn't looking.

Abby was already speculating when she brought her a Caf-Pow and several corndogs at lunch.

"Gibbs seems actually human today. He didn't even have a cup of coffee with him this morning and he still brought me a drink and chatted for, like, a whole five minutes. And you guys don't even have a case! It's kind of weird."

"Maybe he got laid." It was cheeky and revealing and out of her mouth before she really thought about it, and she grimaced.

"That might do it, if it's someone he likes." Abby nodded, then tossed her a sympathetic glance. "Sorry. I know you have a thing for him."

She smiled wryly. "It's fine. I brought it up. Besides, I kind of, uhm, came to terms with it, I guess."

It wasn't a lie, exactly, but she hated deceiving her friend, even if she knew damn well she could hardly admit in good conscience to anyone at work that she was sleeping with her boss (and over the weekend he had started introducing her to his favorite movies from when he was growing up, and she had burnt the popcorn and had had to reassure him that she actually did know how to cook, but he was really distracting).

"All right. I guess that's good. If you're really over it. I mean, I can't say Gibbs is easy to get over."

"Don't tell me you had a crush on him, too." She didn't have to fake shock, or a little horror, or a pleading tone of voice.

Abby shook her head. "No, not really, just figuring by the way his exes seem to keep coming around..." She tilted her head demonstratively. "I mean, he's good looking, obviously, and I'd probably do him if he wanted—don't look so surprised about it!—but it's never been like that with us. Besides, Rule Twelve might as well be written in stone."

She nodded, letting out a breath, (tamping down a spark of possessiveness she realized could spell a _lot_ of trouble) and turned to unwrap her own lunch. "So, how was your date with the guy from Norfolk? He seemed like he would be on your wavelength with most of the science stuff, and apparently he's at least open about the body art."

"It was pretty great." The other girl took a bite of one of her corndogs, holding a hand in front of her mouth as she continued to speak. "We argued about the best decryption algorithms. And then he stayed around to go out to dinner, too. Our glorious overlord wasn't the only one who got some action last night." Swallowing, she smirked.

Kate had to laugh. "He didn't freak out about the coffin? Or did you go to his place?"

"He did freak out about it in the morning."

She chuckled. "Do you think you'll see him again?"

The scientist shrugged. "I hope so. I'll give him a few days to get over the coffin thing. But he's good company. And he _really_ likes being handcuffed."

Kate closed her eyes, taking a bite out of her tuna salad. "A little too much information, Abs."

"Kinks can be very healthy! And it's just sex, you know, the biological act between two individuals of the same species—"

"I know—what sex is. I just don't see any reason to share my sex life with the world."

"Just because you don't have one doesn't mean you should begrudge everyone else theirs." Abby softened the barb with an affectionate grin. "You know, if you want a break from a dry spell, Benji and Sara would totally be up for a threesome."

She didn't have to fake a tight, sheepish grin in return. One, because Abby's friends were not her types at all, even if the thought of competing with another girl for a guy's attention wasn't awkward and weird enough, and two, because she was _so_ not in the middle of a dry spell.

"I think I'll pass, thanks."

"Sara's pretty damn—right, that would probably be TMI."

"You're _probably_ right." Her tone left no doubt.

Abby took another bite of her lunch. "What do you think of the newest addition to my wall? I got it from Ducky." She pointed to a photo of what seemed to amount to a mess of gore processed to be blue and orange instead of flesh-color. "Some guy's lungs burst. I call it 'Man Under Pressure.'"

"It fits pretty well with the rest of your collection." Kate glanced pointedly around the room.

"It does, doesn't it?" Abby's tone was pleased.

* * *

She had never been to Cuba before, but it wasn't all that different from Panama: muggy and hot, with altogether too many insects and various critters for her taste, and a lot less alcohol and sex this time around.  
Or to be more precise, none of either of the latter.

She resisted the temptation to sneak into his bedroom the first night (even if she had claimed it first, and it was the first night in several days she would be sleeping alone, and she found it alarmingly difficult to fall asleep without his breathing next to her and his arm slung over her side).

The rude awakening they got that morning (with a shot of adrenaline, and then the recompense of an extremely embarrassed DiNozzo) put her in a decent enough mood that her restless night wasn't apparent, or at least not obvious enough for anyone to comment on it.

Tony grabbed his keys and dashed out the door, more than happy to chase a girl and go dancing. She waited until the latch fell into place behind him before she rounded on her boss. "Do you mind telling me why—"

"Yes." He didn't wait for her to finish her sentence. She didn't give a damn.

"—he gets to go see the sights and I'm a glorified secretary?"

Gibbs stood to pour himself another cup of coffee, eyeing her. "If you're a glorified secretary, what am I? You're not the only one sitting here with paperwork."

She blew out a breath, and headed towards the table. "Right."

"Tony can't profile, get a read on people like you can."

She was sure it was impossible to miss the silly way she straightened at that comment, and she hated herself a little for preening under the unspoken praise.

He laid a hand on her arm as she passed, turning her towards him, leaning down to brush his lips against hers. "Can't do this with him around, either," was a murmured whisper against her mouth, and she kissed back, dug her teeth into his lower lip.

"Easy, Katie. Work to do." His breath was heavy, his voice scraping against the back of his throat as it formed the words.

"Right." She inhaled slowly and took a step back, turning to pick up one of the files from the table, to give her fingers something to wrap themselves around besides the collar of his shirt.

It turned into a very long day, between the interrogation, searching the apartments, and breaking everything to Agent Cassidy (who was understandably pissed, and her body language was sincere, and Kate knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of Gibbs' suspicions and his particular brand of interrogation, all too damn well).

DiNozzo tried to hide it, but dancing with a good-looking woman who could go toe to toe him and didn't immediately bruise his ego doing it had obviously done a number on him, and Gibbs didn't miss it either.

"That he copied her key without her knowing? Which brain is thinking that, DiNozzo?"

They both watched as he headed down the hall to his bedroom.

"You know, sometimes you can be a real—"

"—bastard?"

So he hadn't forgotten the fact that she had smacked him and cried (and likely would have shot him if he hadn't had her gun) when subjected to his interrogation techniques in a not altogether dissimilar situation. "Yes."

"My gut tells me Agent Cassidy is telling the truth."

"Well, then, what's the problem?" She adjusted her hold on the computer, and then, on second thought, set it down on the kitchen counter so she'd see it first thing in the morning to send it back to Abby.

He glanced down, silent.

"Gibbs?"

"Romance between agents never works, Kate." It was soft, and she could almost disbelieve she'd heard it, but her reflexes knew better. She found herself stepping back as if struck, the edge of the countertop digging into her spine.

"Wh—?!" It was an unintelligible sound, and she took a second to compose herself. The desperate question quickly reformed itself to something far more biting, something that tumbled and fought its way over her tongue with little effort.

"What an optimistic outlook, _sweetheart_. Or does that not apply to us because we're just fuckbuddies?"

She could scarcely believe she had said it, but she was too upset to care.

He tilted his head to look at her, his eyes narrowed slightly, and then he let his eyelids slip down as he bowed his head. "Experience doesn't lie."

She pushed off of the counter, set her hand on his jaw, and turned him towards her again.

"She can go to hell, whoever she was." If it was said fiercely, well, that was how she felt, and how she kissed, too. She kissed to bite and bruise and make him feel wanted as she slid her tongue along his, and the dark light in his eyes admitted just how much he needed this.

She left him alone, still poring over the evidence, to shower, willing her mind numb so she didn't have to think about what he had said.

He didn't say a thing when she manipulated Tony into joining Agent Cassidy on the flight back, or when she leaned her head on his shoulder instead of the airplane window, or when he pulled her closer in her own bed in her Georgetown apartment the next night.

* * *

 **A.N.: I don't feel all that proficient at writing "girl talk" but I love Kate and Abby's friendship, so I try to include it here (even if maybe it doesn't quite belong, because the focus of the story is Kate and Gibbs).  
Also, I don't usually rewrite or do anything but vaguely reference scenes that actually happened in the show, but this one from "Minimum Security" kind of begged to be included.**


	14. Chapter 14

They fell into a sort of rhythm, if you could call it one so quickly established. He had his own toothbrush at her apartment; she kept a change of clothes in her car for the next time he murmured "my place" in her ear in the elevator. If he didn't show up at her place by ten, she knew he was going to be awake most of the night working on his boat. If she locked her door from the inside, he didn't open it.

They took separate cars to work, and it was like a switch was flipped; he didn't pull his punches, and neither did she, and if they teased each other, it wasn't enough to make either Tony or Abby suspicious. She could admire his drive, and he wouldn't praise her for good work, like always, but she still enjoyed her job.

Ironically, it made him practically a different person at night, a little more gentle, a little more open, and she was sure she behaved differently, too, and they kept work talk out of their time together by tacit agreement. It made it easier to pretend, that he wasn't her boss and that there was nothing to say she shouldn't really be seeing him.

She would have burned his boat, too, when he made her shoot her own PDA. But that wouldn't have been quite justice, since what she really wanted to do was make him use it for target practice and couldn't think of a realistic way to do it (and maybe she was a little afraid that actually burning it would definitely kill any burgeoning relationship she might have had with her asshole boss… who used her PDA for target practice…). But she did understand him on some level, even then.  
His Marines were far more precious to him even than his boat.

That was why the first thing she did, after unloading her entire clip into Canton and watching blood paint his now-disfigured face, was direct Tony towards the CIA agent, and hold her breath as she untied the gag. The soldier's eyes followed her, something she was incredibly grateful for, because it meant he likely wasn't seriously injured, though she noted with a pang of guilt that his ear was shredded.

"Are you all right, besides the ear?" She paused, for a moment, to see his pained nod, and then she was scanning the room for a hopefully sterile cloth as she undid the bindings on Major Peary's hands .

"He's still alive. It must not have hit the heart, though he's having some trouble breathing. What's the number for an ambulance around here?" Tony's voice bounced off the walls down here.

"Emergency number is 123." A glance behind herself showed Gibbs pushing himself up off the floor, his face contorted.

She swallowed, refocused, her mind a mixture of steel and jello, and handed the Marine his gag back, untwisting the cloth. "Hold this to your ear."

He wiped off his face, and then she wasn't even watching him any more, reaching for Gibbs' shoulder, not daring to touch. "He didn't hit you, did he?"

He didn't spare her a glance. "Nope. You all right, Major?"

"I'll be fine, thanks to you, sir. And your team." His voice was slow, obviously drugged, and when Gibbs moved towards, him, she moved more quickly, and laid a hand on the soldier's arm.

"You can lean on me while we get you out of here, Major." She slipped her arm around his waist, and he laid a hand on her shoulder, and she shot Gibbs a glance that said _don't you dare think about doing this with your arm_ as blood ran through her lover's fingers pressed over his tricep.

She stared out of windows and saw nothing while they waited—waited for the ambulance to arrive for Agent Gonzales, waited for Gibbs and Major Peary to be patched up, waited to arrive back at CIA headquarters to wait for their flight back.

She couldn't fault him for going in for the Marine. Risking one life to save another, and their job was to try. She wouldn't like him so much if he wasn't the kind of man to go in himself.  
But as the numb horror spurred by that innocuous "relax your shoulder" dissipated, it was replaced by a wet, helpless fury, and she knew she could only wait for that to dissipate, too.

Still, when Tony was out of the room, she reached for him, couldn't help herself. "Gibbs, you scared me." It was quiet, hoarse, monotone.  
He caught her fingers before she touched him, stroked the back of her hand with his thumb before he dropped it, saying nothing.

Really, what could he have said? What could she? She shifted in the uncomfortable waiting room-style chair. "How do you sleep on those plane rides?"  
"What else am I going to do for eight hours?" He offered her the barest of grins. "You stop throwing up after the third or fifth ride."  
"I hope my second ride is my last." She rolled her eyes.

"But we get to go such fun places in planes." His grin widened, and she bit her lip and laughed, and hoped he didn't notice as she used her thumb to wipe the tears out of the corners of her eyes.


	15. Chapter 15

He knew she had a family to go home to—a fairly large Catholic family, for whom Christmas was probably a very big deal—so he didn't ask about her Christmas plans when she asked to leave the office early on the 23rd. It wasn't a short drive to Indiana.

He was surprised, though, to hear the door to his basement open sometime late on the 26th, and to look up to see her descending the wooden steps with a paper bag in her hand, sans makeup, her hair loose.  
"Don't you have family to spend the holidays with?"

In what was, for most civil servants, a rare stroke of luck, his team wasn't scheduled for duty again until the 2nd of January.  
Well, the rest of his team wasn't. Him volunteering to go in during most of the holidays (as if he had anything better to do with all of that time) and work any cases that came up alone probably had something to do with it.

She bit her lip, her eyes suddenly wide and vulnerable. "I want to be here." A hesitant pause, and then she gripped the railing. "Is that okay? I mean, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have assumed... if you want to be alone I can go..." And then she tilted her head. "Don't _you_ have any family?"

He contemplated exactly how much to say, and when she turned to leave again, he forced the best answer he had put together so far out of his mouth. "None I want to go to. None I'd actually want to spend Christmas with."

She looked back at him, nodded with what he thought was a touch of compassion. He set down his tools. He didn't need anyone feeling sorry for him.

"Are there any cheesy Christmas movies you want to watch?"

She hung her head with a sigh and a smile. He'd noticed the few romantic comedies that had snuck into her otherwise fairly tasteful movie collection, but he didn't tease her about it too often.

"I've seen nothing _but_ ridiculously cheesy Christmas movies these past few days, so I hope you have something with lots of car chases and explosions. Or at least a good gunfight. If not, I brought one."

"Sure you want to go back to work so soon, Katie?" He took the stairs two at a time, and she laughed.

She had brought what must have been Christmas dinner leftovers—ham and mashed potatoes and a macaroni-and-cheese casserole and some gingerbread cookies—and even re-heated it was better than most meals he'd had in the past several months, or maybe longer.

"Sure you didn't want to stick around for more of this?" He gestured at his plate with his fork, grinning slightly at the antics of the cowboy and Jackie Chan on the screen.

"Not with what sticking around entails, no. I have the recipes, though." She set her plate on the coffee table, turning to sling her sock-clad feet over the arm of the sofa and lean her head against his thigh.

He lowered the volume and took another bite of mac and cheese. "What does sticking around entail, then?"

She blew her bangs off her forehead. "Let's see. I have an older sister who's a psychiatrist and can't turn the damn analytics off, so she gets into conversations with my mother about possible reasons for why I haven't settled down with a picket fence and two-point-five kids. I have five young nieces and nephews, three of whom are old enough to want to hear stories about Aunt Kate taking down the bad guys, and one tried to grab my gun out of my hip holster. My siblings-in-law I can make small talk with, but that's about it. My father is annoyed he can't brag to his Wednesday night poker buddies that his little girl is protecting the president any more. And three older brothers—do I need to say more? If I wanted to endure that kind of abuse, I might as well be here, where at least I can threaten to shoot Tony in the balls without being worried about six-year-olds in hearing distance."

"They can't be that bad." It sounded a little like heaven, to be honest, a house filled with family, and, going by the affectionate undertone in her voice he doubted she even knew was there, love and care.

"They're not. It's just a bad time." She stared at the ceiling, movie apparently forgotten, and he cleaned his plate and leaned forward to set it on the coffee table beside hers.

A strand of brown-auburn hair lay on her cheek, and he gently tucked it behind her ear. She smiled. "The thing with my dad will blow over, but he was really disappointed when he heard I resigned from the Secret Service to take a job in law enforcement. I didn't tell him why." She chuckled, briefly, self-consciously. "And it was kind of hard to figure out what to tell the kids, you know? It was the first time I didn't have fun stories about the president to tell. Half of it's so brutal, and my mind kept going back to that case in Colombia…" She shook her head. "They see me like some kind of hero, and I'm not."

"They're not wrong. The world needs people to catch the bad guys." His voice sounded too rough to his ears for the words.

"Most of it's you." Her eyes focused on his, dark like good coffee, and he felt his tongue running over his lower lip at the sight of her open like this.

"I am the boss, but we can split the credit. Say... seventy-thirty?" Kate brought out the cheek in him.

She grinned. "What about Tony and Abby and Ducky?"

"Fine. We'll give Abby and Ducky thirty percent, and DiNozzo ten, and then we'll say it's forty for me and twenty for you." He smirked.

She chuckled, adjusting her head. "Sure. Arrogant bastard." There was no bite in her tone, just a teasing affection.

" _You_ said it was mostly me. Was I supposed to argue with you?" He lifted his eyebrows, and she shook her head.

"I didn't expect you to. It's the truth." She smiled. "But it's still the truth that you're an arrogant bastard, too."

He nodded, suddenly sober. She wasn't wrong. He could be arrogant. He was a hard-ass. He wasn't even particularly romantic or affectionate, or even all that nice most of the time. Hell, he was sleeping with his subordinate. On the screen, the Asian guy was having a good old-fashioned bar brawl with some pretty fancy stunts inside some saloon, and he didn't give a damn.

He shifted, gently moving her head to set it on the couch, and picked up both of their dishes to take them to the kitchen.

She was sitting up properly on the couch again when he returned, watching him as he sat back down in his spot.

"Did I say something wrong?"

He set his jaw, swallowing. "I am an arrogant bastard, and I'm hardly the kind of guy to give you those two-point-five kids and a picket fence."

He might have been, once upon a time, but he especially wouldn't have kids when there was a damn high likelihood both mom and dad wouldn't come home one day.

She pulled her knees underneath her, sat on her heels, turned to face him on the couch. "If I wanted that, I wouldn't be here."

He could suddenly see her, glowing and a little flushed, just starting to show enough so that it couldn't quite be discounted as belly fat on her petite frame, bitching more viciously at DiNozzo (not because of anything he'd done specifically, but because she wanted pickles and the cafeteria didn't open for another hour) and not apologizing for it in the least. He'd want to confine her to a desk already, and she would have none of it—and he swallowed and pushed the thought away.

"But you might, at some point. In a couple years, maybe." He couldn't remember ever really feeling old before, not in any way that really mattered.

"Maybe." She shrugged her shoulders slightly. "Do you like theoreticals now?"

"It's not all that theoretical a question." Maybe he was pushing too hard, but he had never been able to just let something go.

"I'm happy without kids. I think I would be happy with them, too. It _is_ kind of a theoretical question, because my feelings would depend on the specific circumstances."

She continued to watch him. "If you don't want any kids, that's fine. Your—what happened to your daughter… I would understand."

He spoke slowly, to cover the fact that he found himself a little startled. "It's not something I've ever really thought about before."

"Then why bring it up?" She tilted her head.

"I don't like to play around." Kate had said it, months ago, barely knowing him, and it was still true.

"What are you trying to say?"

He felt out of his depth, and that hadn't happened in a long while. "I just want to make sure you know what sort of... thing... this is."  
No, he didn't want her to come to her senses and leave, and he did want her to, and even he realized he was in trouble.

"What sort of thing is it, then?" She attempted to hide the serious question with a light, almost flippant lilt to her voice.

"It's not..." _Not the kind of thing where I give you a ring and a happy ever after._ But her gaze was calm and beautiful, and as much as she waited he couldn't bring himself to say it. "Not the kind of thing where we settle down with a picket fence." Close enough.

She turned to lay her head down on the armrest, settling her legs in his lap with a contented sigh. "I hope not. Those things are a pain to paint."

He found himself smiling, and leaned over to kiss her, briefly, just a brush of his lips against hers, supporting himself with a forearm on the armrest. "You sure you're okay with it? I heard I'm kind of an ass."

"I'm really okay with it." Her eyes told him she was telling the truth, and that, ironically, made him wonder more than ever if he was doing right by her, at all, as he carefully, thoroughly tasted her lips again.


	16. Chapter 16

He watched her, for two days. She was stiff and withdrawn and he knew he was partially to blame. He should have insisted _that woman_ stay at the hospital, should have kept a closer eye on her and Kate when he did let her take her home.

Kate had realized, only too late—maybe he would have figured it out sooner, being less close to their Jane Doe, a little less compassionately inclined—but she would have resented anything that resembled hovering or questioning her judgement.

He didn't show up at her apartment after work, either, wanting to give her space, and it was several days after the explosion before he came home to find the light on in his kitchen, the smell of a chicken-and-rice casserole coming from the oven, and Kate twirling an empty wineglass in her fingers, staring at the wall.

He thanked every deity he knew of that DiNozzo had a date tonight and wouldn't be back for a while, if he came back at all—and reminded himself to tell her that Tony was crashing on his couch for the foreseeable future, since he realized no one had likely mentioned it in her presence.

She jumped when he laid a hand on her shoulder and pressed his lips to her hair.

"Hey, Gibbs." She turned her head, to look at him out of the corner of her eyes, and she cleared her throat. "Jethro. Habit by now, I guess."

"You all right?"

"I'm getting over it." She stood, putting some distance between them, and crouched to check on the food in the oven.

"We need a new case. A meaty one. Help you to get your mind off it." They'd had a car accident that turned out to be your regular drunk driving death, and a suicide that was just that, and she had been on point from eight AM to six PM, but he had noticed the scent of extra-strong coffee and the way her makeup didn't quite cover the dark circles underneath her eyes.

She snorted quietly, pulling oven mitts on. "Sure you'd even want me on it?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"A profiler who can't recognize the person in front of her is a murderer?" Her voice carried all the derision no one else had ever directed towards her.

"You were too close to her. Sometimes it's hard to see what's right in front of you. But you did see it."

"Not in time." The _clank_ of the dish on the counter was loud, and her voice was flat. "There was a man who lost half a leg, crushed underneath his desk. A woman whose left eye was destroyed by flying debris."

They had taken Kate to the hospital with some of the other victims, to give her fluids and watch her for a few hours, since she had several cuts and burns and had been exhibiting signs of shock. He hadn't followed, and she had called Abby to pick her up when they released her. He only knew because Abby had mentioned it to him the next morning, her face drawn tight with worry.

" _She_ set off the bomb, not you."

"But I could have prevented it. I should have." She opened one drawer after another. "I hope you have a spatula."

He pulled it from the metal tin where it sat on the counter in plain view, alongside a whisk and several wooden spoons. She flushed as he offered it to her.

"What do you want me to say? I'm not going to lie to you. We all should have done better."

She didn't even flinch, though she swallowed hard, and stabbed the dull edge of the utensil into the cheese crust with more force than was really necessary.

"But everyone makes mistakes. You can't dwell on them. You can't let them make you doubt yourself." He tried to keep his tone soft, cursed internally. He had never been good at this comforting thing.

"Where were you a few days ago?" Her tone was wry, slightly mocking, full of empty bravado.

"What do you mean, where was I?"

"When I was debating whether or not I should resign." She stood on her tiptoes to reach the shelf, and the sound of dishware clanking startled him into movement. His fingers closed gently over the plates, and she hesitated a moment before letting go.

"What do you mean, resign?" He spoke sharply as he held out a plate for her to lever a casserole square onto.

"Have you never possessed a dictionary? I mean, resign. I had a letter typed up and everything." She set a portion on the other plate, too, and then puts the mitts on again to set the food back into the still-warm oven, her voice matter-of-fact, warming as she talked.

"I thought it over. Even if I hadn't been so close to her, I don't think I would have been able to tell. It's one thing to get an idea of someone with a history, when there's an established baseline. When they themselves have no clue who they are… and I really don't think she did, at least not at first."

He fished a fork out of his jumbled silverware drawer-two, and handed one to her. "Why didn't you, then? Try to resign?"

She lifted one shoulder. "I figured I could still do more good on your team than—I don't know, as a security guard or something."

He separated a bite from the portion on his plate, and raised it to his mouth. Fighting the impulse to close his eyes-so she _could_ cook, and damn well-he chewed and swallowed before speaking again. "I wouldn't have accepted it. Your resignation."

She stopped, her fork halfway to her mouth, and slid onto the seat at the small table she had previously been occupying. "What do you mean?"

"I'm not going to let you waste your talent and training over something as stupid as that."

She pushed her plate away, practically glowering. "Getting a building blown up, three people dead and multiple people severely injured, that's ' _something stupid_ '?"

"Your insecurities are stupid." Kate opened her mouth to protest, but he continued talking, internally bracing himself for the backlash. "You've been focused these past few days. You've made good judgement calls. You've been careful not to let that case affect the current one. And you're not going to make that kind of mistake again."

"You want to make this into some kind of _lesson_? People _died_ , Gibbs!" Her voice was rising, and he saw the hint of moisture in her eyes, and he wondered if she had cried yet.

"Might as well make some smidgen of good come out of it." He set his plate down on the table beside hers. "And the blame's not all yours to bear."

"Where were you a few days ago, really?" She swayed towards him, then straightened again, looking down at her lap. "I would have liked to have you around."

"What for?" He finally did what he had been wanting to do, for a several minutes now, and stepped closer, to wrap an arm around her shoulder and comb his fingers through her hair.

She leaned into his touch, closing her eyes, and rested her head against him. "Just… like this."


	17. Chapter 17

If Gibbs had been withdrawn recently, she chalked it up to more DiNozzo in his life. Obviously Tony, nosy as he was, would wonder what she was doing at his place, or why Gibbs suddenly seemed to have a life outside of work if he spent the night at her place too often.  
Ironically, it seemed to make him more willing to tease her at work, making fun of geeks or prompting her to play off him when confiscating Colonel Egan's employer's files.  
She would have been happy, that he seemed to be loosening up, and DiNozzo didn't even notice, except for the fact that she quickly realized she had gotten far too used to not sleeping alone most nights anymore.

So when Tony mentioned how glad he was to go home, she punched in Gibbs' number. He usually didn't mind having someone to talk to while he was waiting on his mid-morning coffee. First coffee of the day was a different story.

"What's up, Kate?" His words were crisp, and his tone almost happy.

"Hey. How does Sunday sound?"

"For what?"

"Us. Spending some time together. Going out."

The tinkle of a shop door bell and the sound of him slurping his coffee preceded the noise of tires on tarmac. "Why are you asking me about this during work hours?"

"I'm allowed breaks, too, you know."

"Make it staying in and you've got yourself a deal. I don't like taking unnecessary chances." She hung her head slightly, and nodded.

"You want to come by around seven?"

A pause, the sound of a car door closing, and then it was much quieter on his end. "Sure."

"It's a date, then."

He hung up abruptly, like always. She refused to read anything else into it.

Come Saturday evening, she had just finished putting the macaroni-and-cheese casserole together and fitting it into the freezer when her cell phone rang. The number on the screen was familiar. "Hey, Gibbs."

"I won't be there tomorrow."

She stifled a noise of disappointment. "Why? What happened? Do we have a case?"

"Plumbing burst in the apartment above DiNozzo's. He'll be camping out here for a couple more days."

She pressed her lips between her teeth. "You're allowed to go out once in a while, Gibbs. And he'll hardly assume you're going out with _me_. The most obvious conclusion would be that redhead who picks you up sometimes." And she bit back the question of exactly who she was, again. He had told her they weren't involved, and that should be enough for her.

"It's better if I don't, Katie." Somehow he made more lurk than behind that statement than the obvious, and she was about to ask exactly what that was, but the line went dead.

She had barely seen him outside of work in weeks. It was a damn flimsy reason to call off their date-if you could call it a date-and she set the phone down on the counter, simply staring at the leftover grated cheese sitting on the counter.  
For lack of something else to focus on, she set the plate into the refrigerator, grater and all, and then the little note on the calendar on her door—"J. Movie night. Pirates."—was practically mocking her.  
After several moments, she grabbed her gym bag and car keys, desperate not to wonder why this was bothering her so much.

She had turned down Abby's offer of a night out with her and a few friends and Timothy—with whom Abby seemed to be getting along really well—in favor of "a date", so she was going to ask come Monday morning.  
The surgeon excuse emerged somewhere around noon on Sunday. It was plausible, fairly original, didn't reflect badly on her—she was still a little vain about that kind of thing, so shoot her—and she practiced until it came naturally.  
She just didn't expect it to annoy her quite so much when the time came to actually tell it.  
So she was already smarting a little when Melissa Dorn opened the door and that warm "Oh, you've already helped" came out of Gibbs' mouth.

After the unofficial search of the house, she slid into the passenger's seat as Gibbs bagged the sycamore debris, forcing herself to speak calmly. "You know, I know we didn't—define this as—as anything, really. I guess I just assumed—but you know, I'd really appreciate it if you didn't flirt with another woman right in front of me."

Buckling her seatbelt, she swallowed. She wouldn't let him see how exactly how sick—literally sick to her stomach—it had made her feel, or, when queasiness gave way to fury, how much she wanted to shoot him, either.

He turned the key in the ignition and pulled out of the driveway. "I was giving you time to search the house." His voice was even, as always, and somehow that makes her even more furious, even if it was a passable excuse—as far as excuses for that sort of thing went.

"There are other ways to do that. And _you_ initiated it!"

"You catch more flies with honey, Kate. If you don't have anything else to say that's relevant to the case , it can wait. Do you think there's such a thing as matching plant DNA?"

She inhaled through her teeth. "Yes. I mean, plants have DNA, so I don't see why it wouldn't be unique and possible to match like ours."

He stopped the car a short ways down the street. "What are you doing?"

Handing her a small evidence bag, he gestured to the tree outside. "Grab a sample."

"What for?"

"Did that order somehow not sound like one to you, Kate?" His tone had turned sharp, and so she ducked her head and opened the door.

"Does it matter what kind of sample?"

"No. And don't label it yet."

"Why not?"

"I can explain later, but right now, I don't want to be noticed loitering."

 _Right. Probably don't want to let Miss Dorn think we're actually investigating her, so you stay in her good flirtatious graces._ It was a little petty, maybe more than a little, but she kept her mouth clamped shut so there was no way she would accidentally say it aloud, even though she really wanted to tear into something.

She grabbed several leaves and seeds like the ones found on PFC Dorn's boot, sealed the bag, and shut the car door with more force than was necessary once she was back inside. Gibbs pulled a pen out of glove compartment and held his hand out for the evidence bag.

She watched as he scribbled on it. "But that didn't come from the tree outside Melissa Dorn's house."

"I want to test this matching plant DNA thing, if Abby says it's possible."

"So you're going to question her expertise now, too?"

"Check everything for yourself, Kate. Rule Three. Already forgotten?" She turned her head away at the crisp reprimand, and watched out the window on the drive back to DC.

She wasn't exactly proud that she grilled Tony on Gibbs' relationships and love life during the drive to Baltimore, but she knew she needed to relieve this irrational jealousy. What she heard didn't help, though—made it seem a little less irrational, in fact—and she finally shoved it into a mental box and brought up the subject of tattoos again to distract him (though he did use the opportunity to narrow down the location of hers to her ass, which was a little embarrassing).

But it was at the end of the case that the last straw came, so to speak. Tony had finally settled on believing it was a rose on her butt, or at least pretending to believe it, and when Gibbs insisted on correcting him, with that unique husk to his voice she otherwise loved to hear…

Well, in that moment she wasn't sure what to think. Offense that he'd share even that much flooded through her, and then she caught Abby's smug smile, and attempting to hide it was almost second nature by now.

He didn't help her in any way, and so finally she just shook her head and headed to her desk to pick up her coat and bag. She didn't glance back, sure he'd still have that smirk on his face, and equally sure that the expression on her face would definitely give away more than they both already had.

Abby's boots thudded on the floor behind her. "Hey, Kate, wait up!"

"Really not in the mood, Abs, sorry."

"Hey. Hey. What's up?" The other girl laid a hand on her shoulder, following her into the elevator. "You and Gibbs? He actually broke Rule Twelve for you?"

"Sort of." With a sigh, she adjusted her coat over her arm, turning to face Abby, reminding herself that her friend didn't deserve to be snapped at.

"And he was… He _actually_ broke it?" In all fairness, Gibbs breaking his own rules was pretty hard to believe, so she tried to forgive Abby's momentary hang-up on it.

"Pretty much. You could probably say that." Kate shifted her weight onto one leg. "We slept together before I came to work here. And then… didn't—well, we stopped for a while. It started again about when you and McGee got together."

"So _that_ was why he was in such a good mood. You cheeky little—and you didn't tell me!" Still, Abby hugged her, excited, and she shifted her belongings awkwardly to one arm to attempt to return it, straining a smile.

"It's not that I don't trust you. I just—well, he's my boss." It still felt strange admitting it.

"Oh no, I get it. I didn't tell anyone I was sleeping with my biology professor, either, even though I completely earned my grades." The other girl stepped back, grinning, and then peered a little more closely at her. "Hey, what's wrong?"

She bit her lip, shaking her head. "Just… a lot of stuff at once kind of thing. He was flirting with a suspect earlier, right in front of me, and just now… He _has_ to know Tony is going to continue to torture me about what my tat is now—and if he's smart enough, about how Gibbs knows what it is, too." She sighed.

"Ouch." Abby winced, wrinkled her forehead. "Was she a redhead? The suspect?" Kate shot her a _what do you think?_ look. "Sorry. But… even that doesn't really sound like him." The goth frowned slightly.

"Damned if I know." The elevator doors opened. "Hey, do you know if Tony's place has been fixed?"

"Before or after the guys upstairs flooded his apartment?" Abby asked.

"After."

"No clue, sorry." She gave Kate an apologetic half-smile.

Kate shook her head as she stepped out of the elevator. "Nothing you have to apologize for. Good night, Abs."

"Night, Kate. And you are _so_ telling me about everything later. Assuming, you know, there's still something to tell about. Even then, you're telling me."

She let out a curt laugh. "Sure."


	18. Chapter 18

He turned up the volume of the Farm Report as high as it went to drown out his thoughts as he worked. The wood already sported several nicks where he had stumbled over a memory—that cheeky little fox on her ass, the way she curled up into him under her sheets, that wounded look in her eye when she had told him, very calmly, that she would appreciate him keeping any further flirting out of her sight—and now he had to smooth them out again.

The couch upstairs was empty, and he kept on glancing towards the basement door, wondering if he'd missed the sound of it opening.

But he hadn't.

It was close to midnight when his cell rang, and he flipped it open eagerly, apprehensively. Three marriages taught him to guess when he was in trouble, even if it didn't mean he was ever going to change to avoid it.

"Hi, Jethro." Kate's voice was quiet.

"No 'what the hell' this time?"

"I can add that, if you really want to hear it." There was no mirth in her voice.

He wanted to laugh, didn't quite dare to. "I'm okay without it."

"Abby knows." She didn't quite interrupt him, but her declaration nearly scraped his.

"You _told_ her?"

"No, _you_ did when you might as well have shouted 'I've seen Kate's ass.'" Her tone was sharpening now. "I didn't see the sense in trying to deny it after that."

" _Kate._ " He exhaled, slowly. "Does DiNozzo know?"

"I didn't say anything to him. But I'd be willing to bet he's going to be asking what it is again tomorrow, and maybe if I have any clue how you know, too." She paused for a split second. "I don't think Abby will tell him, even though I didn't specifically say not to."

"She probably won't, but dammit, Kate, you didn't have to confess!" He was still thrown. They had agreed to keep it quiet. And there hadn't been any mention of a time limit.

"She had already put the evidence together, or most of it anyways."

He swallowed. Nothing to do about it now. "What was her reaction?"

"Surprised you'd sleep with me." There was a self-deprecating laugh. "Since we work together. Other than that, pretty happy about the whole thing, I think."

He nodded slowly, then remembered she couldn't see him. "All right."

"Is it really—" She stopped, and exhaled. "Look, I'm sorry. Abby's my friend. And I don't like keeping secrets from her."

He had no real response to that.

"She likes the idea of us together, if it means anything. Threatened me if I were to hurt you, though."

"She probably does know about a hundred ways to poison you." It was something to say. _Goddammit_ —that was another nick in the wood.

"More than that, I'd bet."

He chuckled, somberly, and then the line crackled with silence.

"Jethro?"

"Mhm?" He set his tool down, frustrated with himself.

"Who is that redhead who used to—does she still pick you up?"

He rubbed a hand over his face. "We still see each other from time to time."

"Do I want to know what 'seeing each other' means?" Her voice was low, with a slight choke in it, which she did her best to hide.

"Do I seem like the kind of guy who would sleep with more than one woman at once, Kate?"

"You tell me. I didn't have you pegged for the kind of guy who would blatantly flirt with another woman in front of the woman he's sleeping with, either, but we all know how reliable my instincts are these days."

"I was giving you time to search the house. It was the easiest way to distract her." It had been a terrible decision, if he was honest with himself, but he didn't back out once he had committed to a strategy.

"If I'm not what you want, Jethro, that's fine. Just… tell me that." She paused, inhaled, and was obviously trying to steady her voice when she continued. "I know… this isn't anything serious. You made that clear—hell, it started with pretty much a one-night stand—but I won't be disrespected or treated like—like some toy you can pick up and put down and ignore whenever you like."

He swallowed. "I don't want Melissa."

"Gee, now why would I assume you want a relationship with a woman with a history of murdering marines?"she bit out, and then sighed. "That doesn't mean you want me. I've been operating under the assumption you do, but I've barely seen you in month and then with her… I have no clue what to think right now."

"DiNozzo was here."

"Yeah, and you never go out somewhere to drink every now and then?" Her voice hadn't lost its sarcastic undertone.

"No, Kate, I don't."

"Does he know that?"

He ran a hand through his hair, cursing internally. This brought back too many memories, too many fights, and as damn gorgeous as she was when her eyes lit up and her hand went to her Sig, he didn't even have that as a consolation prize right now. "I can't read minds. Do you really want DiNozzo making snide remarks all the time?"

"He already _does_ , you ass!" Her voice rose, and then she took a deep breath.

"He'd be making a hell of a lot more of them, and he'd be harder to shut up."

"Still, I really don't think he's the type to go to HR. But hell, what do I know?"

"Stop doing that," he ground out.

"Stop doing what?"

"Doubting yourself."

"I have every damn reason to!"

He grabbed his bourbon and took a swig. "Then go back in for training. I need my profiler ready for when I need her."

She let out a bitter, half-snort. "Sure, boss. You'll have her."

" _Kate._ "

She was silent for several moments. "It was a good suggestion. I'll sign up for a course tomorrow morning. "

"Just sign up for the test."

"Gibbs…" Her sigh was probably meant to hold some sort of warning, but it just sounded tired.

"You don't need the training. You just need to prove to yourself you can."

Her laugh was tired, too. "You're such a bastard." There was no bite behind it.

"For suggesting you do something to fix how she screwed with your head?" He wouldn't give _her_ a name. They could hardly have done anything differently, but he wished she had stayed buried, even if it would have meant Brauer would have gotten away with murder.

"For screwing with my head."

It took a moment before he could reply. "How exactly, in your opinion, have I been doing that? Because if I wanted to get into your head, you wouldn't know."

(He really wanted to screw other parts of her, actually-it had been several weeks for him, too, and he wasn't used to it anymore-but he'd mostly repaired his mind-mouth filter by now.)

She exhaled. "Just—do I matter to you, Jethro? I'm not always sure."

"Of course you matter to me." It was hard to say. She should already know.

"Because it doesn't always seem like it. Sure, I'm your agent, you want me in good shape so I can do my job, but… beyond that. I don't care—this isn't any 'say you love me' conversation—I just—I'm not going to be some throwaway stand-in. I need to know you—respect me, and think about how I might feel every once in a while."

"I told you I was bad at relationships, Katie." The pet name slipped out, like bourbon sloshing over the rim of his paint jar. He took another drink.

"That doesn't excuse you not even trying." She was so matter-of-fact about it.

"I—" _I am_ , he had wanted to say, but then that wasn't really the truth, when he thought about it. It had just been so damn easy with Kate.

Well, he shouldn't try, should let her go.

He paused, took a deep breath. "Her coffee was terrible. Melissa's."

She exhaled, a dry laugh buried in her throat.

"And she was… too damn coy. Like, she thought she could play with me." The alcohol made his throat a little less dry.

She had reminded him a little of Shannon, when she first opened the door, and it had slipped out, and then he had felt Kate at his back and regretted it.

"You played with her." A moment, then: "And the other redhead?"

"You want to pull all my secrets out of me tonight, Katie?" He found himself grinning slightly. He had no idea when the near-fight had turned to a conversation, but his chest felt a little less tight, and he found himself, for a split second, believing this thing wasn't some ticking emotional time bomb.

"Because you're so willing to share them at any time." There was a jab in there somewhere, softened by a quiet throatiness.

He chuckled a little, nodded before he spoke. "Vanessa. We went out a few times, years ago. I thought about making it more serious, but she turned me down." A little wryly: "Probably why we still get along. I see her whenever she's in town."

"See her?" Kate's tone was sharp.

"Is someone—" He stopped, bringing his drink to his lips again. It was blatantly obvious she was jealous, and that struck him, shocked him, twisted his guts pleasantly. He was nothing to be jealous over.

After a second or two, when he could talk without his consternation showing, he answered. "See her, as in sit down, talk, have a few drinks. We don't sleep together. Haven't for years." (And she had been good, but Kate was better, Catholic school be damned.)

"Thank you. For telling me."

"Welcome."

She lingered, her breathing soft.

"DiNozzo's gone," he offered. "If you wanted to come over. Or for me to head to your place." His mind was stuck on that track now, _thank you very much, Katie_.

"It's almost one in the morning. We have to be at the office at eight." Her protest was hardly heartfelt.

"I really don't think the boss will mind."

She laughed. "I'd like at least a little sleep tonight."

"Sleep's overrated."

"Unlike you, I can't run on pure coffee." Her tone was amused. "Tomorrow?"

"Just about any damn time you want, Katie."

"Careful, or I might just take you up on that."

She was going to kill him one of these days. "Is that supposed to be a threat? Because it damn sure didn't sound like one."

She laughed, her voice soft as she spoke. "Good night, Jethro."

"Good night."

He was to able to sand out most of the damage over the course of the next hour or so, before he finally headed upstairs to try to sleep himself.


	19. Chapter 19

**A.N.: Caveat: I have no clue how they train police/FBI profilers, and Google didn't want to give me much information, so I tried to wing it. I assumed NCIS has some place where they train their officers, and it would likely be close to HQ in Washington, D.C., so... *crosses fingers it isn't too weird***

* * *

Of course "tomorrow" was a dangerous promise to make in their line of work, and he had known that. He made sure to take Tony with him to inspect the warehouse their sniper had shot from that night, though, because, despite their tacit agreement not to do anything while they were working a case, he didn't quite trust himself not to push her up against a wall and kiss her senseless and he really didn't want to do that in a concrete box reeking of urine. That conversation wouldn't leave his mind, _the minx_.

When he got the e-mail notifying him that one of his agents, one Caitlin Todd, had signed up to test out of the criminal psych course and, assuming he gave his approval, would be able to take the exam in a week, he nearly growled, rising from his chair. "Kate, come with me."

They found the psychology instructor, a rather skinny, bespectacled man younger than himself but older than Kate, in his office.

"I have a student here for you to test."

The man wrinkled his brow, shuffling through papers on his desk. "I'm sorry, we don't do individual exams of any kind. Which course is she in? I can give you the date of the test for hers."

He shook his head. "There is a sniper picking off marines. Right now. I need my profiler."

"Well, if she's confident enough to take a test, I'm not sure why she can't just—"

"I've already had training." Kate spoke up now. "But I made a rather significant error recently and I'd like to make sure…" She gestured vaguely, shaking her head. "For my own peace of mind."

"I'm still not sure why that would necessitate—"

He stalked around the desk, eyeing the computer screen very deliberately, where some shooter game or other was open. "Since you don't have anything else _useful_ to do, I would _suggest_ —" he paused, to underline that it wasn't really going to be a suggestion, "—that you test her. Now."

Scowling, the man swallowed, and nodded. "I'm sure there's a room free."

"Good. We understand each other." He plastered on a smile that wasn't really friendly at all. "Let me know if he's an ass to you, Kate."

She smiled and glanced at the ground as he passed her, but didn't reply.

Her smile and the way she held her shoulders when he met her again several hours later told him everything he needed to know. "Went well?"

"Yes."

"Think you can put together a profile for me now, Kate?" He kept his tone quiet, watching her. "Barnes can't be our sniper, so we really need some new insight."

She nodded. It didn't take long before he had a profile and the team had a plan. Still, he knew the sight of her in a uniform was going to drive him crazy.

* * *

"I missed it, Gibbs." She shook her head, wisps of hair that had escaped her bun hovering around her face as she stared up at the bullet lodged in the glass above the door. "I missed it again."

He held the door to the recruiting station open for her. "I missed the guy, too, Kate. We were both focused on the recruits. You did your job."

"I should have—we shouldn't have narrowed it down to the recruits. It should have occurred to me that he could pose as something other than a recruit. He was good. A recruit would have been too obvious."

" _We_ , Kate." He headed behind the desk to retrieve his discarded flak jacket, and she hovered a few steps behind. "Not just you. Don't go doubting yourself again."

"You could have _died_ , Gibbs!" She closed the distance, raised a hand to touch his face, and stopped just before she made contact, dropping her hand on his chest instead.

"You could have died." Her voice was practically a whisper, and he knew it was the last of the shock and adrenaline finally draining from her system, her breathing a little heavy, a little shaky.

He swallowed, uninclined to think too much about the incident that had caused that shock. "But I didn't."

"You should have worn your vest." She shoved lightly against his chest, making him step back so the pillar hit his shoulderblades, her eyes dark. "Dammit, Gibbs, you should have worn it."

"Wouldn't have helped much, Kate. He was shooting at my head." He had to focus on his words, otherwise he would have just stared at her, the way her chest heaved as she inhaled, the way her lips shone, already a little reddened and swollen from her nibbling on them on the walk back.  
He would have told her to stop it, but then he might've had to admit just how much she distracted him when she did that.

"You—God, I thought my heart was going to stop. I am so, _so_ glad they put in bulletproof glass. Why didn't you _tell_ me?" He hadn't known, himself, but she didn't wait for an answer, just rose on her toes to plant her mouth on his, without finesse. He still closed his eyes, and let her tongue in between his teeth.

It took several moments before they separated; she was panting and he took several gulps of air to clear his head. "Katie." Another breath. "Kate. The entire front of this place is glass."

"I can't say I particularly care right now," was her glassy-eyed reply, and didn't _that_ idea send heat flooding down his body—but he laid a hand on her shoulder.

"We have to get back to HQ. Debriefing. Interrogation, if the guy's still alive." There were other things, too but they weren't occurring to him at the moment. "Close the case properly."

She closed her eyes, inhaled, took a step back when she looked at him. "I—I'm sorry. You're right. I—"

"Are you _apologizing_ for kissing me?"

"I—isn't that—didn't you just remind me it's a little inappropriate right now?"

He leaned down to brush her lips with his. He'd meant it to be quick, accompanied by a murmured _"never apologize for that_ " as they made their way to the door. Instead, she nipped at his lower lip with a little moan, and he ran his tongue over her lips almost reflexively, and as she pushed herself up against him, he gave in to the impulse to set his hands on her firm little ass and pull her closer.

His pants were uncomfortably tight when then broke apart again for oxygen, and he could feel every heaving breath she took. "Not here. Or in uniform." It was hard to say, because he really wanted to do this, period.

"Right." She hung her head, rested her forehead against his chest, running her fingers up his shoulders and under his collar. He wondered if she was conscious she was doing it. "Just... don't die on me, Gibbs, please."

"I don't plan on it."

She nodded, lifting her face as if to kiss him again, and then whirled away at the last second, swallowing. "We should really get back."

"Right." He bent down to pick up his flak vest from where he had let it fall to the floor, and she flipped the lights and escaped out the door.

Later, though, far later, when she opened her apartment door to him, silhouetted against the light from her living room, he smiled at her. "Permission to enter, Cap?"

Kate smirked, straightening her posture a little in the oversized Marines t-shirt (one of his he had left there) and flannel pajama pants she had already changed into. Biting her lip, she opened the door a little wider and stepped to the side. "Permission granted, Gunny."

* * *

 **A.N.: I'm no good at writing smut, not really, not unless I have some scene I really really can't get out of my head. But I couldn't resist dwelling on the uniforms a little. I'll leave the rest what happens here to your imagination.**


	20. Chapter 20

"Kate?"

She eyed her boss, beside her in the NCIS truck en route to HQ from the crime scene. "Yes?"

"Why is the sheriff under the impression I'm not seeing anyone?"

"Well, you aren't, boss-are you? And anyways, how is Kate supposed to know?" Tony, driving again, something she was _not_ happy with, glanced at Gibbs, too.

"Is your name Kate?"

"Uh, no, boss, sorry. Wrong equipment for that." Tony smirked. She rolled her eyes.

"Then keep your mind on the damn road."

"I certainly haven't heard you mention a girlfriend or anyone serious. Anyone you're comfortable with people knowing you're dating, at least."

The word _girlfriend_ almost sounded cheesy, not dignified enough for someone Gibbs would be involved with, anyways.

"That doesn't mean I'm available." The sentence seemed to cost him a good deal of effort.

"I didn't tell her you were. I just said I wouldn't know if you were available or not."

It hadn't been the best response, maybe, but it had been truthful. Sure, they were sleeping together again most nights—and maybe she liked to flatter herself that he seemed a little calmer, needed a little less coffee, had slightly lighter dark circles under his eyes after he woke her in the morning with a quick kiss, or sometimes a longer one that turned into something else and made them both almost late.  
But she was not going to make any kind of assumptions anymore.

"You know I'm seeing someone."

"As you demonstrated recently, seeing someone doesn't always mean you're averse to flirting with someone else. Hell, maybe she's your type. She's definitely straightforward."

She was baiting him, maybe. Really, habit had kicked in—covering it up, even if she was getting a little sick of that game—and he was making it into more than it was.

"Whoa, wait. You're seeing someone and Kate knows? Who is she? How come _I_ don't know?"

"Road, Tony!" This time it was her correcting him. The landscape was whizzing by the truck at what was most certainly not the mere 65-mile-per-hour highway speed limit and she was nervous enough as it was.

"I expect no snide remarks when she starts flirting with me, then."

"Just tell her you're involved and I was wrong. Problem solved." She lifted a shoulder.

He shot her a glare. "I don't want to have to deal with the fallout of a potentially pissed-off sheriff blocking our investigation."

"I really don't think she's that petty."

"Damned if I know what'll set a woman off," he mumbled, shaking his head, and practically glared at her again.

"Seeing multiple women without them knowing about each other is one thing I can tell you will definitely piss them off." Her growing annoyance was starting to color her voice. "Really, it's not that hard to tell a woman 'sorry, I'm already involved with someone,' is it? Women, unlike men," she eyed Tony briefly, "generally respect that."  
Most would probably thank Gibbs just for flashing that damned charming smile at them, no matter what came out of his mouth concurrently.

"I respect when a woman says she's taken!"

"Yeah, I bet you suggest she dump her guy because you're sure you're so much better." DiNozzo would never not get on her nerves.

"Hey, you can't argue with the truth!" He lifted his fingers from their grip on the wheel in a gesture of defense, though his palms stayed in contact with the faux leather grip, something she was grateful for.

He must have caught Gibbs' glare, though since his quickly curled his fingers around the grip and added, "Not your lady, though, boss. I mean, I probably don't know her-unless-is she someone at NCIS? Morrow's new secretary? Tell me and I'll steer clear of her."

 _Damn male chauvinist._ Of course he would respect Gibbs telling him to back off, but not her.

"DiNozzo, just drive!" This time both she and Gibbs growled it in unison, and Tony sat back in his seat, taking a deep breath and fixing his eyes on the road.

* * *

"Hey, Abs." She moved in front of the desk to get the lab tech's attention.

Glancing up, Abby removed her earphones. "Oh, hey, Kate."

"Here's the stuff from the murder in Halifax." She nodded to the box in her hands. "Brought over by the sheriff personally. Do you want it on the table?"

"Yeah, put it over there." Abby shrugged on her lab coat, narrowing her eyes. "Do I detect a note of resentment somewhere?"

"Maybe. I—the sheriff obviously likes Gibbs. And she's been flirting with him, incredibly openly, pretty much non-stop. And they just went to lunch together." She set the box down, grimacing slightly at the red indentations on her fingers where the edges of the handles had bit down.

"Ouch." The scientist joined her, inspecting the contents of her delivery. "Hrm, at least they labeled things decently. Doesn't always happen with local LEOs. Gibbs wanted me to check the bullet?"

"He wants you to check everything." Kate smirked slightly.

"Well, of course he does. But the bullet should be pretty telling."

"Oh, there was also a urine sample they dug up from the dirt at the side of the road. They wanted it tested for DNA, but the state lab hadn't gotten around to it yet."

"Right-o."

She watched for a moment as Abby dug through the various sizes of evidence bags, biting her lip as she turned to leave.

"Nu-uh, you don't get to go yet. I still haven't heard a thing about you and Gibbs, like you promised." Abby didn't look up from sorting through the evidence.

"Could you keep it down a little bit? I don't want someone randomly walking by—"

"What's the big deal? I mean, okay, it's officially against the rules, but nobody's going to care. It hasn't been an issue before at all, has it?"

"No." She sighed. "But Tony…for one, he'd crack some smartass remark every time Gibbs asks me to go with him for something."

"He might. But Gibbs would shut him up fast. He doesn't want to be on his bad side." Abby glanced up briefly.

"If he cared." She lifted one shoulder. "Gibbs would shut him up, if Gibbs cared," she clarified in response to the goth's wrinkled brow.

"Of course he cares about you. He _broke a rule_ for you."

She smiled, wryly. "Ignoring rules is kind of his thing."

"Not his own rules." Abby's pigtails swayed as she shook her head.

"I just…" she ran a hand through her hair, suppressing a laugh. "We haven't even been on anything resembling a date yet. Sometimes I don't know what to think."

She found herself pacing. "I knew what I was getting into. I don't expect him to turn into someone else. I don't expect him to treat me differently at work, or, hell, even all that different at home. I don't want a proposal or even a 'where is this going?'-type conversation. God, I don't even know what I _do_ want. I just… I want more."

 _What did you think would happen? Things would come to a natural, gentle end?_ She wanted to kick that mocking little voice she'd been able to mostly suppress so far.

"You know what sounds like a really weird idea?" Abby had picked up the evidence bags with the bullet and the dirt containing the urine sample, her voice tinged with just enough irony to make it apparent. "Talk to him. I don't know why it's not standard procedure in just about any relationship. It really helps to get your kinks all out there right at the beginning."

"Kinks? Was that another goth-BDSM thing that just flew over my head?"

"Probably." Abby grinned, and Kate blew out a breath, then returned the smile.

"I've got to get back. But… thanks, Abs."

"No worries." The scientist turned to her machines—Kate had no clue which they were or what they did—and started in on the evidence. And if Kate thought she heard a murmured, "Gibbs, you idiot," behind her as she left, it must have been her mind playing tricks on her.

* * *

"Gibbs?" She glanced at him, recalling Abby's advice, and tucked her arms around herself a little more. It pressed her seatbelt to her chest, the horizon approaching faster than was probably legal.

"Yeah?"

"She's still flirting with you."

"You're the one who told her I was available." Of course he wouldn't let something like that go.

"Did you want me to proclaim myself your girlfriend?" Sarcasm dripped from her voice.

"Well, maybe not announce you're sleeping with me. But I've got a girlfriend, don't I?" He kept his gaze fixed on the road.

"Do you?" She wet her lips, and looked at him. "I'd like to be. But you don't always behave that way."

"I told you I'm terrible at relationships." He was still terse. "I'm not flirting with her."

"I didn't say you were. But you haven't dissuaded her, either." She could act, pretend she wasn't aching to place herself bodily between Sheriff DuPray and Gibbs and leave a touch of her lipstick on his mouth. But that didn't keep it from grating at her.

"I told her I was seeing someone. Over lunch."

"Okay…?" She huffed out a breath, a sigh. "I'm trying not to… get territorial about it or anything. You're not a possession. And I can see that you're not encouraging her. Well, except for the fact that you spent the entire afternoon with her yesterday." She tried to unclench her jaw, and leaned back against the headrest.

"She said the fact I was seeing someone wouldn't stop her from saying what she was thinking. Or trying to go after what she wanted."

"So it probably wouldn't have made a difference, whatever I told her." The breath she let out was almost a laugh. "Is she distantly related to a freight train?"

"Maybe if she didn't get the idea I was up for grabs in the first place…" He tilted his head slightly.

"I'll tell any and all prospective suitors you're taken, then, next time. Happy?"

"Yeah." It was said slowly, with just a hint of pleasure. She felt his gaze on her, but by the time she had turned her head, he was staring straight ahead at the road again.

She bit her lip, cursing the fact that her heart was doing somersaults, and suppressed a smile.

* * *

 **A.N.: It was really hard to finagle the canon events of this episode into the story, but I'm happy with the result.**


	21. Chapter 21

She couldn't touch him, not like she wanted to; she couldn't wrap her arms around him and hold him as his eyes moistened, staring at Colonel Ryan staring out the barred window and at the same time staring at nothing. Still, she brushed her fingers down his arm, and he didn't look at her, and she stayed there, silent, until he finally turned away.

She followed him home, and he held the door open for her behind him, so she followed him down to the basement and stayed there, too.

"He was here." Gibbs' voice was quiet, and when he finally looked at her, she dared descend the steps to join him in the half-dark.

"Colonel Ryan?"

He nodded as he turned to sift through the array of tools on his workbench. "Found my gun, took the bullets out. Otherwise I would've brought him in at gunpoint last night. When I realized he was seeing Lieutenant Cameron."

"I'm so sorry."

"He wasn't wrong. He was still pretty sharp."

"At least they're optimistic about his recovery." She spoke softly, a little hesitantly.

He nodded, once, and silence fell once again. She tried not to hover, but she knew she was lingering, unsure whether to stay or to go, reaching out to rest a few fingers lightly on his upper arm. She didn't dare do more, didn't think he'd want more.

"You ever worked with wood before, Kate?"

"I had one shop class in high school." He removed his blazer, and she did the same, taking his to drape them both over the railing.

"Remember anything?"

"Not much, I'm afraid."

He handed her the plane, closed her fingers over it, and gently led her to the boat frame, his fingers splayed over the small of her back.

"We only ever used power tools, and that's been ages. I have no clue how to do this. I don't want to damage it." She was here for him. If this was what he wanted, she'd do it, be more than ecstatic to share this with him—but that didn't mean she wasn't afraid.

"Don't worry so much. Lean into it. Use your weight." He set the tool on one of the ribs, adjusted her posture. "Scrape up and forward."

Thin wood shavings slowly curled above the scraper and tumbled down to the floor, and he rested his hands lightly on her hips and watched.


	22. Chapter 22

**A.N.: Major divergence from canon starts here.**

* * *

"I did, however, want to see if I was right about you."

The terrorist's breath whispered over her ear, and Kate adjusted her tenuous grip on the scalpel as it nearly slipped through her fingers.

He released her, roughly, and she stepped back, for balance, her heels colliding with the floor and jarring her. _You were trained for this. You're better than this._ And the last, _what would Gibbs do?_

She kept her eyes trained on him as she stepped forwards again, and he trained the gun on Gerald's knee. "Caitlin. Don't do anything stupid." His voice carried the stilted beginnings of a plea. In another situation, she might have liked his accent.

"Just… setting it down." She mimicked a tight smile, stepping in front of him, between him and Gerald, to approach the metal tray. Ducky's eyes were on the nape of her neck; she could feel them, filled with foreboding.

"Give it to me." He held out his hand.

Kate swallowed. She knew what he could do. She knew what she could do. She knew what he knew she could do.

"Gladly."

She took a step forward, grabbing ahold of his left hand, twisting it to point the gun towards her, towards the floor—anywhere away from Gerald and Ducky—as he yanked his arm, attempted to free it from her grip. His other hand wrapped around her neck, his knuckles digging up under her chin. She plunged the scalpel into his wrist beside her thumb.

The sound of the shot bounced between the walls of the too-quiet room, echoing in her skull, and she fumbled for a grip on the gun as his fingers loosened, spasmed, blood slick beneath her fingertips. Pain flashed somewhere below her knee, rushed up her leg as she stumbled, her side slamming into the autopsy table, her shoulder into Gerald—he groaned. Her opponent was reaching for the weapon with his other, still good hand, and she sucked in a breath, her temples pounding, and tightened her grip, pulling the trigger.

He staggered backwards a step as the bullet lodged in his vest, and she edged away herself, her aim shaky, her breath coming in shallow bursts as she supported herself against the table with her hip. Her calf throbbed. "No closer."

The phone rang, splitting the silence, heightening the scowl she could see in his eyes, and there was movement, somewhere—she hoped to God it was Ducky doing something useful, but her focus was trained on the terrorist, on his slow shuffle as he edged away.

"You don't really want to kill me, Caitlin." His words were expelled through almost-clenched teeth, the slow drip of blood on the floor punctuating his speech. "If you did, you'd have done so by now. Unloaded that weapon into my forehead. I bet you're a good shot."

She knew he was messing with her head; she'd seen Gibbs do it a thousand times before, and she tried to keep her head from whirling, tried to keep her attention on his movements as he slowly shuffled towards the door—"Don't move."

Someone murmured behind her, and then Ducky raised his voice, another cacophony to reverberate in her skull, along her jaw. He was holding something now—she didn't know where he had retrieved it from. "Hands where I can see them."

"Must you take all the fun out of it, Caitlin?"

He raised his arms, let something drop, and she heard the scrape of metal across the floor. Her gaze leaped to the canister, then back to him as he edged towards the door, almost jogging now, and she aimed for his legs and fired blind as the flash grenade went off. Smoke filled the room.


	23. Chapter 23

"I'm not sure, but I think I heard a shot."

The voice in Gibbs' ear made his throat close up, and he forced words past the blockage. "What do you mean, 'you're not sure'?"

"Could've been a gunshot, but whoever shot would've had to have a silencer if they did. It wasn't loud enough otherwise."

"Hold. We're calling them again." The Director beat him to speaking by a split second.

He scowled. She was in there. She and Ducky and Gerald were in there. "Get as close as you can without being seen. Team in the elevator, disable the bell, open the doors, get ready."

The phone rang, over his headset, through the director's mic, and he checked his gun in his holster, torn between heading up to MTAC and down to autopsy. He chose down.

It took a moment—he took a breath, hoping to God it wouldn't just keep ringing as he hurried down the stairs.

"Autopsy." Ducky's voice.

"What's the situation?" The audio from MTAC was slightly garbled, but still understandable.

"Kate has his gun, for now, but she's shot in the calf. Where the hell are you?" Ducky's voice rose in pitch, vibrating with tension.

A _bang_ , a flash from inside the room as he rounded the corner in the stairwell and autopsy came into view, and several more shots rang out, and he didn't wait to hear anything else. "Go!"

Smoke obscured his view, and in the chaos of all the agents storming the room, he didn't dare shoot. Ducky stood to the side, still holding the phone, silent now, his shoulders drooping tiredly. Gerald lay still on the autopsy table, and the neon pink shirt beside him was like a beacon.

He threaded his way over to Kate, noted her wide eyes, the way she held the gun in her right hand, supporting herself on the table with her left.

"We got him. Nearly stumbled over him. Looks like his ankle's blown, shot to hell. He couldn't run."

He lowered his weapon, nodded to her, realizing his breath was coming fast. "Your leg?"

"Calf. I think." She looked a little pale, and he holstered his Sig.

"Get these two to the ambulance!"

Several of the FBI hostage team were already hoisting Gerald up off the table, and Ducky had appeared at his side. "Be careful with his shoulder!"

"Calling another ambulance." The room was a mass of bodies and noise. He tried to shelter her.

"Kate is going with Gerald, and I don't give a damn whether that bastard lives or dies." He lowered his voice, reaching out to wrap an arm around her shoulder. "Wrap your arms around my neck."

She blinked up at him, took one hopping step with the help of the table, grimacing. "Where's the ambulance?"

"Nu-uh." He crouched and swept her up, prompting a quiet shriek of surprise. "You're not walking on that." She was heavier than her frame would imply, the compact weight of muscle, but still more than light enough for him to carry, and up close, he saw her breathing was quick and shallow.

He raised his voice, heading toward Receiving, where the ambulance was waiting. "Move!"

She relented, locking her fingers behind his neck, and curled her head into his chest.

Blood had already soaked her pant leg and was pooling in her shoe when he handed her to the EMTs, and she nodded when he reassured her he would be at the hospital later to pick her up, leaning her head against the side of the truck wall.

* * *

There was something about hospital beds that made people in them look fragile, and it was strange to see Kate among all that stark white as he pulled back the curtain.

She smiled at him, a pleased, soft expression, even if it was a little wry. "Hi."

"Hey."

Her leg was bandaged, and splinted, and propped up, and there was an IV line in her right arm, and she visibly grimaced at him as he looked her over. "What's the damage?"

"They removed a bullet lodged near my fibula. The shot fractured it. Otherwise it's mostly muscle damage. It hurts like hell, though."

He pulled up a rolling stool, keeping his eyes on her. "'Fraid you're gonna have to be stuck on desk duty for a while."

"Don't remind me."

He reached out to tuck a wisp of hair behind her ear, and then he couldn't stop touching her, running his fingers over her shoulder, squeezing her hand. "Don't do that again."

"Now you know how I feel." There was a hint of a laugh in there somewhere.

"We were getting ready to go in there. You should have waited."

"Gerald needed medical attention. And we had no way of knowing whether or not he was going to make good on his promise to let us go, once we were no longer useful as bargaining chips." She lifted one shoulder, lowering her voice a little, gazing into the distance, obviously reliving a memory. "And I couldn't stand being in there, and not doing anything, bowing to his wishes, especially after he shot Gerald."

"Impatience and stubbornness are not good reasons, Agent—"

"Save it." She snapped, and then sighed, and leaned her head back on her pillow. "We don't know what would have happened if I hadn't done it. The outcome for this scenario is fine."

He set his jaw, and tightened his grip on her hand. She turned to look at him again, and laced her fingers through his.

"Is he dead?"

"Nope, more's the pity. Last I heard he was in surgery to repair the blood vessels in his wrist—he nearly bled out on the way here—and then they'll fix his ankle. Because apparently we have to make sure the people who want to kill us are happy and healthy while they're under our watch." He wouldn't keep his displeasure out of his tone, even if he could. "He'll stay here under guard while he's recuperating, and we're waiting on more intel. Someone's got to have something on him."

Kate nodded, let out a breath. "He better be transferred from here straight to prison."

"I don't think you should worry about that, Katie. There's no way in hell we're letting him go."

Her eyes were wide and dark, and he refused to think about how he could have lost her, and he wouldn't have been able to do anything about it.

"Hey, Kate, lookin' hot! Hey, boss."

"Hello to you, too, Tony." Kate rolled her eyes, and he glanced behind himself to see his other subordinate framed in the gap in the curtain.

"DiNozzo." He didn't really want him here, but couldn't really deny him seeing his injured teammate.

"Think you'll have a scar? Heard the chicks dig scars and war wounds."

She huffed out a laugh. "Attracting 'chicks' is not exactly on my list of priorities."

He wondered if the light squeeze of her hand was even conscious. He untangled their fingers, stood up, stared at DiNozzo when the other agent glanced at their hands and wrinkled his brow.

"I'm gonna see if this place has any decent coffee."

"Oh, wait, boss, before you go—we got something on the guy." Something in the way Tony's face twisted made his stomach drop.

"You planning to tell me what this 'something' is?" He arched an eyebrow.

Tony lowered his voice to practically a whisper, just loud enough to be heard over the activity of the ER beyond the curtain. "Mossad finally talked to us. Apparently he's a mole of theirs inside Hamas, and they're hoping to get him into Al-Qaeda. They want him back."

"What?!" He stood, staring at Tony for a moment, but there was nothing but earnest frustration in DiNozzo's face.

Gibbs swore. "We are _not_ turning this guy back over to Mossad or the CIA."

"I think they'll overrule us, boss."

He glanced back at Kate, whose brow was wrinkled, and she pressed her lips together. "It would explain a few things." She glanced up at him.

"Like what?"

"I don't think he wanted to hurt Gerald. I mean, hurt him just to hurt him. He didn't use any jihadist rhetoric, or even mention Islam or Allah. He was very controlled, methodical, and mission-oriented. He wasn't eager to kill anyone, only to do a job."

He frowned, and she returned his gaze calmly, and he shook his head. "We are not letting this guy go."

She nodded.

"I've got to call the director. Tony, you stay with her." As he left her bedside, unclipping his phone from his belt, he noted with satisfaction that DiNozzo was still wearing his gun.

* * *

 **A.N.: I attempted to research gunshot wounds, but if you notice any mistakes in this or ensuing chapters, please let me know.**


	24. Chapter 24

She was released from the hospital several hours later, with a pair of crutches and the instructions to rest, eat, and hydrate.

Abby was with her when he returned to pick her up, mascara streaked down her face, but smiling as she gripped Kate's hand tightly in the waiting room.

"Thanks, Abs. I'll take care of her."

"You'd better." She sniffled a little.

"Hey. It's not your fault, remember? " Kate squeezed her friend's hand. "I'm glad you weren't down there."

"I know." Still, Abby swallowed visibly, and he sensed this was something it would take some time for her to come to terms with.

"You want to ride with us?"

"No, I'm heading back."

"Back to where? The office? It's practically nighttime, Abby, get some sleep."

She grimaced. "I asked Ducky if I could sleep in autopsy."

"Wow." Kate's eyebrows shot up and she simply regarded Abby for a moment, with an expression that could be termed pride. "I hope you sleep well."

He nodded. "Good luck with that, Abs."

"Thanks."

Reluctantly, she released Kate's hand, and Kate grabbed her crutches, shooting him a slight glare as he reached out to help her up. "I'm not an invalid. You're not taking me out in a wheelchair, or carrying me, or anything like that."

"Never said I was going to, Katie." Still, he stayed right beside her as she made her slow way towards the exit.

"Good. Just so we're clear."

"What sort of stuff do you want me to pick up from your apartment?" he asked, once she was safely in the passenger seat beside him.

"What do you mean?"

"You're not going back to your place. You don't even have an elevator."

She let out a noise of protest, and then sighed.

"Clothes, obviously. You can grab my toothbrush, or not, I know you have a few spares. Hairbrush, shampoo, conditioner… I have a duffel bag in the back of my closet. My sketchpad and the book I'm reading right now are on my nightstand—I'd appreciate if you could grab those, too."

"All right."

She was quiet, her eyelids fluttering shut every now and again, and for her sake he tried to drive a little slower than he usually did, not take the curves quite so forcefully.

He knew, from experience, that gunshot wounds—especially with the amount of bleeding she'd done—took it out of you.

He did ask her to check that he'd gotten everything she wanted while they were still parked in front of her place. He'd left her in the car, because there was no way he wanted to watch her make her awkward way up the stairs, and she was sure to refuse his help.

He did have to watch her figure out how to manage crutches and stairs at his place, but at least it was only one flight compared to the three she'd have to climb to reach her apartment. Staying close, he insisted on being the one to carry her bag, and she just exhaled and let him.

He left her to change and settle into bed while he brought up a glass of water. She had already burrowed under the covers and propped herself up against the headboard when he returned, and he sat sideways on the bed next to her.

"Here."

She took several gulps, her tongue darting to lick a few stray drops off her lips when she set the glass down on the nightstand beside her. "Thanks."

He nodded, heading over to his dresser. He could feel her eyes on him as he changed out of his work clothes. "You should sleep."

"So should you." Her voice was quiet. "What about the terrorist? Does he even have a name?"

"Ari Haswari. Mossad and CIA are standing firm that they want him back, and want us to help him stage an escape so they can still use him. Morrow isn't having it," he sighed, suppressed something close to a growl, "but I'm not sure he can hold out if they take it up a level, because you mention Al-Qaeda and you can get just about any government sap to agree with you these days."

"You don't think stopping Al-Qaeda is a good goal?"

"Of course it is, Kate, but he's not _in_ Al-Qaeda. He's in Hamas, carrying out attacks on our people, here. He _shot_ you. He _shot_ you and Gerald."

Pulling a T-shirt over his head, he turned to look at her again. She stared back at him, leaning against his pillows. "Don't tell me you're advocating for this guy, Kate."

"I'm not." The corner of her mouth curled up wryly. "Though in all fairness, I was the one who pointed the gun at my leg." She sighed. "He didn't try to kill any of us. I don't think he did anything any other mole hasn't done at some point."

"Why do you give a damn? He. Shot . You."

"I guess it's about the principle. I don't know. I guess I don't." She glanced away as he climbed into bed beside her, then she scooted down to lay fully horizontal, the covers bunching up beneath her splinted left leg.

"Just go to sleep, Kate." She could hardly lie on her left side like she usually did, and he waited for her fidgeting in her new sleeping position to die down before he wrapped an arm around her, hoping to stave off the nightmares he knew would come.


	25. Chapter 25

She did insist on going in to work the next day, still, and it was something he could respect, though she had to admit she could hardly drive with her leg. She had slipped a bottle of painkillers into her purse—something he didn't comment on—but she seemed sharp enough.

They stopped for coffee on the way—a long stop, where he didn't have to ask what kind of coffee she liked, and grilled her, carefully, for a fuller profile of Ari.

If anyone found it strange that they arrived together, no one said anything, but then half the agents in the bullpen weren't as observant as they should have been.

Tony was already at his desk, eyeing his empty hands, resting against his thighs to keep himself from laying a hand on her back or her arm in a gesture that really wouldn't actually help her balance better on her crutches.

"I can drive her in tomorrow, boss. So you don't have to skip your morning coffee."

"I've already had my morning coffee, DiNozzo, but keep talking and I'll need another one. Do we have a case?"

Tony grimaced slightly. "Uh, none yet."

"Then you and Kate go through anything you can pull up on that bastard from yesterday."

"What are you going to do?" Kate glanced up at him, having settled into her desk.

"I'm going to see if Ducky's gotten around to finally doing an autopsy on Qassam."

* * *

"I was wondering when you'd get down here, Jethro." The medical examiner glanced up from his desk. "How is Caitlin?"

"She won't cut herself any slack." He cleared his throat before he could say anything too damning. "What've you got for me?"

"Well, the cause of death was rather obvious, gunshot wound to the heart. He was beginning to show signs of a smallpox infection, but luckily it hadn't yet reached the stage where it would have been contagious." Ducky donned a pair of latex gloves. "Still, we sterilized everything afterwards just to be safe. You never can be too safe, you know. There was one student I attended medical school with, a pathologist. By all accounts he was following all prescribed procedures, but-"

"That's all good news. Anything else?" He kept his tone fairly patient for now.

"Yes, two things—" the doctor lifted two fingers to emphasize his point. "Firstly, please emphasize to the director the necessity of temporary medical examiner's assistant while Gerald is recovering. It takes much longer without one, and I have three new bodies that came in today alone."

"Not really my job, Duck, but I'll see what I can do. What's the other thing?"

Ducky spoke without turning around as he made his way to the x-ray illuminator, where several films were still hanging. "How long have you and Caitlin been seeing each other?"

He exhaled, debating what to say, and in the end didn't say anything.

"Good God, Jethro, it's hardly a life-or-death question, and the way you acted yesterday I'd be surprised if half the building doesn't suspect it." The medical examiner cast one stray glance towards him before he pulled down an x-ray and began scrutinizing it.

"A while." His voice was a little hoarse.

"I _knew_ it. Even on Air Force One, you could practically cut the tension between you two with a knife-"

"All right, Ducky." He injected a note of warning into his tone.

"Does Human Resources know?"

"No, and I'd like to keep it that way. I want to keep her on the team."

The doctor paused, and looked at him for a moment, raising his eyebrows. Gibbs only halfway fought the urge to scowl.

"Good luck with that, my friend."


	26. Chapter 26

Tony came over to crouch in front of her desk the moment Gibbs stepped into the elevator, folding his forearms over one another and resting his chin on them. "Okay, I can't believe I'm about to say this, but… you and Gibbs?"

She was surprised at how little it surprised her, and more, at how little it concerned her. Still, she put down her pen and narrowed her eyes at him. "Really? Are you that desperate for ammunition this morning?"

"No, I'm serious! I mean, he took you home last night. And picked you up. And didn't call me to do it."

She sighed and moved her mouse so her monitor wouldn't fall asleep. "Abby was busy sleeping in autopsy. Which reminds me, I need to go see her over lunch and ask her how that went."

"So _Abby_ will be taking you home tonight."

She pretended to be very interested in the file on her monitor. To be fair, it actually was interesting. The guy had gone to medical school. Why the hell had he then become a Mossad mole?

"You know, there was also the fact he was holding you hand in the hospital." Tony paused, then lowered his voice. "Kate and Gi-ibbs sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes-"

It hit a nerve she hadn't known existed, or had at least been trying to ignore. "Don't you _dare_ finish that, DiNozzo, or else I _will_ shoot you."

"So you _are_ shacking up—"

"You know what, when he comes back from the morgue, you ask _him_ . I'm sure he, unlike me, won't have _any_ problem telling you _all_ about his love life."

Okay, it was kind of a coward's way out, using his authority by proxy. But if anyone was going to "come out" to DiNozzo, it wasn't going to be her.

"So you admit that you are part of his love life." Tony stood, grinning.

She rolled her eyes. "No, I'm only pointing out that _if_ I'm involved with Gibbs, like you seem to think I am, then you're prying into his love life, too."

"All you had to do was say 'no, Tony, you're an idiot'."

"You are an idiot. But you wouldn't have believed me if I just said 'no, we're not together,' would you?"

He wrinkled his forehead, slowly lifting one finger. "Hrm. No, I probably wouldn't."

She smirked at his back as he retreated to his desk.

She glanced up when Gibbs returned, watching him (okay, maybe drinking in the sight of him). "What did Ducky tell you?"

"Nothing we hadn't already guessed."

"By the way, Tony has a question for you." She hadn't consciously intended to say it, at least she didn't think so.

"Is that so?" He tilted his head slightly to eye Tony.

"You know what, boss, it's not that important."

"Tony here thinks we're together. I thought he should hear it from you."

His focus snapped to her, one eyebrow arched. She shrugged one shoulder and held his gaze steadily, watching, waiting.

"What makes you think that, DiNozzo?" It was quiet, offhanded.

"Um, nothing much. It was a stupid—I wasn't thinking. I mean—you took her home. And in the hospital… you were holding her hand, boss. But you know, it's really none of my business."

"No, it's not. What have you got for me?"

To be fair, she hadn't expected anything different, even if she was slightly disappointed, a little numb, and it wasn't difficult to keep her tone even.

"He went to medical school in Edinburgh, specialized in infectious diseases. That would explain why Hamas sent him to do the cleanup after Qassam's operation. His mother is Arab, and he worked with her in a hospital in the Gaza strip for a while before he started working for Mossad. I'm working on contacting some of his colleagues in England to see if I can get a little more insight." She continued to type as she spoke.

"Let me know when you have something. DiNozzo, anything else on Qassam?"

He fidgeted in his chair. "Not yet, boss, but I'm waiting to hear from Special Agent Cassidy. She's going to see if she can get anything else out of the guy who told us about the op in the first place."

"Find something useful to do in the meantime, and tell her to e-mail you instead of videoconference. The Director is still holed up in MTAC." Gibbs turned to head up the stairs as he spoke, then stopped and glanced back. "Kate, you like Italian?"

She was sure her surprise showed on her face, quickly morphing into horror. "Please don't tell me this is some kind of lead-up to going undercover with Tony."

"Nope." She caught a glimpse of a grin on his face before he turned around again. "Wear something nice tonight. We can go by your place to pick up whatever you need."

The sight of him retreating up the stairs transfixed her for several seconds before Tony's voice broke her out of it.

"Did Gibbs just ask you out?"

"Did _you_ hear a question in there? He didn't _ask_ me anything." She blew her bangs off her forehead and fought the urge to cover her face with her hands or punch something. (She really didn't need a broken knuckle, too.)

Luckily, Tony seemed too shocked to actually comment on the whole conversation for several hours, so she was more productive than could really have been expected for most of the day.

* * *

 **A.N.: Because Gibbs is an ass and also sometimes a cheeky bastard.**


	27. Chapter 27

He swallowed, suddenly wondering why he hadn't done this earlier.

She had gotten used to navigating stairs on crutches, but he had still insisted she let him get the clothes and things she wanted, once he had convinced her that yes, they actually were going out.

So he had already seen the sleek red dress, and knew she would look good. But his mind hadn't been able to conjure this vision.

She had left her hair down, straight, framing her face, something he didn't see often enough on her. Thin streams of silver dangled from her ears and traced along the smooth definition of her collarbone. He didn't know a thing about makeup, but she had done something that made her eyes turn to liquid chocolate when he caught her gaze, and he couldn't bring himself to care when it felt like liquid was filling his lungs.

She bit her lip. "Hardly a really great picture with the crutches, right?"

He shook his head. He had hardly noticed the damn things—even though the dress could outline her curves more clearly if her posture was a little different, not leaning on the metal supports.

Her expression fell, and she twisted her smile, and shrugged. He quickly cleared his throat.

"That's not—you look great, Kate."

She inhaled, dipped her head, and he saw that twitch at the corners of her mouth that said she didn't quite believe him. "Thanks." She tapped the floor idly with one of the crutches. "Are we going to head out? I'm ready whenever you are."

He held the door open for her.

* * *

"Table for two for Gibbs?" The maître d' asked, scanning his list.

"That's what I just said."

"If you and your daughter could follow me, sir…"

"Oh, I'm not his—"

The young man kept his eyes on Kate as he led them to a table in the back. "What happened? How'd you come by the crutches?"

"Fractured fibula. Gunshot wound." Didn't she notice he had interrupted her? She was too damn polite.

"Uh, wow. I'm sorry. I—I don't know what to say."

Setting the menus down on the table,the maître d' was quick to pull out a chair out for her. "If you need help with anything…"

She smiled at him, maneuvering to sit down in the chair, smoothing her skirt. "Thank you."

"Adam. The name's Adam." He tilted his head slightly and grinned.

Gibbs fought the urge to growl, though he moved closer to her and eyed the kid. He had to be five years younger than her, at least. (He knew there was some hypocrisy there, but right now he didn't give a damn.)

"Thanks." Kate's smile tightened as she handed Gibbs her crutches.

"We'll be fine." He leaned them against the table on his side, staring at the maître d', who swallowed when he glanced at Gibbs again.

"Of course, sir."

He stepped forward as "Adam" stepped back, to place his hand on the back of Kate's chair and his lips on hers. The kiss was more thorough than may have been appropriate for the establishment, but she didn't seem to mind, swallowing a whimper as he withdrew. He didn't need to look to know the maître d' had fully retreated.

Kate gave him a small smirk, the glaze over her eyes fading, as he sat down opposite her. "You have a little lipstick…" she swiped her thumb over the corner of her mouth to demonstrate.

He imitated her and his thumb came away with smudges of dark red.

"You still have some—"

"I don't mind."

Briefly raising her eyebrows, she opened the menu. "Possessive, are we?"

" _We_ _—_ " he paused to emphasize the word, and she glanced down, briefly, "both have every damn right to be."

"That might be the most romantic thing you've ever told me." There was a laugh somewhere in her tone, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth that she didn't try to fight, but he still leaned back in his chair as if he'd been punched in the chest.

"I'm not a really romantic kind of guy, Kate."

"Did I ever say I expected you to be? I mean, even this…" She glanced around, opened her mouth to say something, and hesitated, for a split second, before she spoke. "I wasn't ever really sure even this was going to happen before today."

"But you want it, don't you?" His voice was low, and it wasn't really a question, and he could see that flicker of surprise in her eyes. She never tried to hide anything; she shouldn't be damn startled when he read her. "Some guy who's gonna bring you flowers, and get down on one knee, and who doesn't have—" He couldn't bring himself to say it. "Whose personnel file doesn't look like mine."

"Stop it, Gibbs. I'm not asking for that." She straightened, and he could see her armor slide into place. "God knows I've dated enough guys who brought roses every single time and never gave a damn about me." Her throat flexed. "That's not you."

He nodded. _She should have all that, though._ Just because she wasn't asking didn't mean she didn't want it, the flowers, the ring; it was written in the twitch of her lips, the slant of her eyelids, and just because she didn't believe she could have everything…

"Jethro." Her fingers brushed the back of his hand. "I'm happy. Okay?"

"It's important to you, though. Marriage."

She blinked, taking one last look at the menu before she closed it. "I—" There was a certain tension in her pause, before she exhaled and opened her mouth to try again.

"Have you decided what you'd like to order?" The waitress' tone was friendly if cool, and he wondered why on earth he hadn't seen her approaching.

Kate waited for him to order first. "I'll take a meat lover's calzone. And water for the table, please." He didn't know if she had taken her painkillers recently—and he wasn't going to ask—but he knew she wasn't supposed to mix them with alcohol.

"I'd like the spaghetti alla carbonara." Kate handed her menu to the waitress with a smile.

"Thanks for remembering," she said, when they were alone at the table again.

He nodded.

She took a deep breath. "Sure, I'd like to be married, if I find someone I want to spend the rest of my life with. Right now, I'm happy if I can stand someone, and they can stand me, for more than six months."

He swallowed. Six months already, since she had come to work for him. Sure, not all of them involved them sleeping together, but he still watched her, observed the minutae of her expression, and she watched him back

"Heard Abby did pretty well last night in autopsy."

She opened her mouth, and he could see the switch in trains of thought in the flutter of her eyelids. "Yeah, apparently the self-imposed immersion therapy worked wonders. She even went down to visit Ducky today, but she wanted to sleep there again tonight just to be sure."

"Good."

He fished for something else to say—there could be no get-to-know-you small talk, and he'd feel dishonest acting as though he needed to tease her into his bed (especially when all they'd be doing there tonight was sleeping).

"Have you told any of your family? About your leg, what happened?"

"You know all I've been up to today; you tell me." She smirked for a moment, and then shook her head. "I'll be fine. They'd only worry, and there's nothing they can do. It'll be a cool scar to show my nieces and nephews at some point, that's all."

"Makes sense." He hadn't told Shannon and Kelly what war was like, either.

The waitress returned with the water, and he poured her glass for her.

"To putting that bastard behind bars." He raised his glass.

"To putting him behind bars." Her voice was a little softer as she continued. "And to six months and two weeks."

Her smirk dared him to say anything. He drank instead.

His cell rang. With a scowl and a quick, apologetic grimace, he flipped it open. "Gibbs."

"Haswari's gone."

His throat closed. He could feel himself going rigid, and he swore, loudly enough to make the nearby diners turn and stare. Kate nearly dropped her glass, her eyes wide.

"What happened, director?"

"A bomb went off in the hospital, just under two hours ago, in the ward where he was staying. They evacuated all the patients they could. We haven't been able to locate him since."

"Then get some agents down there and _find_ him!"

"What do you think I'm calling you for, Agent Gibbs?"

He closed his eyes, swallowed. He shouldn't have needed that pointed out to him, should already be on his way. "Yes, sir."

He grit his teeth as he flipped his phone shut, relaying the information to her curtly.

She pressed her lips together and nodded. "Go. Call Tony. I'll ask Abby to pick me up."

Of course she couldn't work in the field, not now, and her gaze was dark and downcast.

He handed her his wallet and her crutches, and brushed his lips over hers as she dug around in her purse for her own cell, to call Ducky's desk in autopsy.


	28. Chapter 28

He noticed, already, while interviewing witnesses, how much he missed her, her careful scrutiny, her relevant questions, her insight afterwards. It was easier, too, having a third set of hands on the crime scene, and it was after midnight when he finally returned to his own house, trying not to wake her as he slid under the covers.

The next day was spent with more of the same, interviews upon interviews, waiting for Abby to finish processing the evidence, waiting for Ducky to cross-check the burnt corpses' teeth with the dental records of the people they were presumed to be, waiting for the report from the fire department and the subpoenas from JAG and for some kind of answer from Mossad.

He pushed the door to the observation room open. Kate shifted in her chair to glance towards him, then back at the olive-skinned man sitting in interrogation.

"I don't trust him. He's lying about something."

"Everyone has something to lie about." He looked through the glass at the hospital janitor, too, more to keep from seeing her leg than anything else. "What _exactly_ did you notice?"

"He fidgeted when he was talking about being sent over from that temp agency. And he made too much eye contact when he denied having anything to do with the bomb." She sighed. "But all the evidence we have against him is circumstantial. And the company did confirm they sent a Mexican man to the hospital to fill in yesterday."

"I _know_."

"I can tell you what to pursue, Gibbs. I can't make him confess. That's your job." She shot him a tight, tired smile.

They were alone in the room, so he combed her hair back from her face and bent to touch his lips to her forehead.

"He must have had an accomplice. He just had surgery on his ankle yesterday. There was no way he could walk, or even wheel a chair on his own with a damaged wrist. He was supposed to be out still—that's the whole reason why we didn't interrogate him yesterday." Her words were muffled against the crook of his neck.

"We _will_ find this guy." It was a promise.

"I talked to Gerald yesterday evening. He'll be fine—he's still pretty weak—but he's going crazy sitting around, and it's a pain trying to do everything one-handed."

"I _will_ get him if it's the last thing I do." The fury eating him up blazed through his voice.

"Hey." Her tone had softened, filled with concern, and she reached up to brush her fingers over his jaw. "Don't talk like that."

"Five people _died_ in that hospital, Kate. Two of them were kids. Not counting the patients who might still die from complications or burns."

She flinched and leaned back, letting her hand drop to her lap. "I know." Her gaze flicked back to the man in interrogation, her eyes dull and hooded, her mind somewhere else. "You don't have to remind me, Gibbs." It was practically a whisper, a little hoarse. "We'll get Haswari. Go back in there. Have him tell his story again, backwards."

He shut the door quietly behind him.

* * *

 **A.N.: The next chapter really belongs with this one, but I've made it a habit not to switch between viewpoints in the same chapter, so you get multiple short ones instead.**


	29. Chapter 29

He stumbled over his words, tensing until finally his gaze fell to the table and he fell silent. She narrowed her eyes behind the one-way glass.

"Mr. Hernandez? I need you to tell me what you did." Gibbs leaned against the wall of the interrogation room behind the suspect. "But we have all day."

"I was cleaning—I was cleaning the women's restrooms when the bomb went off. Before that, I was emptying the trash in the children's ward. Before that, I—" He blinked, his eyes roving.

"See, that's not what you said before." Gibbs' tone was even, low, dangerous. "So let's try the truth this time, Mr. Hernandez. Like I said, we have all the time in the world."

The suspect began to shudder, and covered his face with his hands. "My name is not Hernandez."

"I thought not. You didn't speak enough Spanish for that."

His voice was muffled through his fingers. "Bassam told me to do it. It was the backup plan in case anyone was captured. I did not—it was a _hospital_ , not a military camp. I tried to put it where it would not hurt anyone, but I did not think they had made it so strong. It was my first mission…"

Gibbs reached for pen and paper. "Slow down, and we'll get all this down. You think they'll come for you, too? Do we need to start screening the people who come in here?"

"I do not know. I am not so important."

 _If they had thought he was dead…_ Her job mostly done, she sat back, keeping one eye on the suspect, but her attention was elsewhere.

 _"You don't really want to kill me, Caitlin."_

 _I should have unloaded the gun right into your forehead, like you suggested._

* * *

 **A.N.: I am terrible at actual case stuff. Constructive criticism on this, as on everything else, is welcome.**


	30. Chapter 30

Abdul didn't tell them much. He didn't know Haswari, only a man he referred to as "Bassam". Abby told them more about the explosives than he could. He didn't know who had set off the bomb he placed—though he suspected it was remotely detonated from the hospital parking lot. He couldn't even give them a license plate number or the location of their safe house, insisting he and Bassam had always met in a corner of the park, and that this had been his test of sorts prior to proper initiation.

Gibbs went at him for hours, shoving the photos of the burnt corpses of those two little children in his face, until the man broke down and sobbed, and Gibbs was frustrated and flushed and furious.

Tony hung back as she knocked on the door to interrogation, officially "there for support" but lacking the guts to actually do it himself. Hell, her heart was racing, too—she barely knew the agent in there with Abdul.

Gibbs glared at her as she inched the door open and tilted her head in a silent gesture for him to come out. He stood, though his voice was low and sharp as he shut the door behind himself. " _What_?"

"You have to stop, Gibbs."

He stared at her for a moment, took a step forward, and his nostrils flared as he inhaled. "You want me to _stop_ trying to find this bastard?"

"You need to stop going at this guy, for now. He's given us all he knows. He's crying his eyes out in there. Anything more would practically be considered under duress. We couldn't use it." She eyed him, counting her own heartbeats. "How long has it been since you've eaten? Hours? He's been in there since before lunchtime."

He glanced at the door, setting his jaw.

"Take a break, Gibbs." She tried not to soften her tone too much, however much she wanted to beg. "Let him stew. Maybe he'll remember something more. Tony can bring him up a salad from the food court. Abby's isolated the components of the explosives; I'll start calling places in DC where Hamas might have been able to get it. They've brought in a computer whiz from Norfolk to see if they bought the stuff online, too. This guy isn't our only avenue to finding them."

Gibbs turned, in one quick movement, and practically stalked down the hall. "DiNozzo, you make the calls. I'll get the food. Kate, you'll be in there with me and him afterwards; I want a sketch of this Bassam guy."

Behind her, Tony let out a breath. "Wow, he didn't kill us. You must be _really_ good in bed."

She elbowed him in the gut, hard.


	31. Chapter 31

He woke to her nuzzling the crook of his neck, and pulled her a little closer with a quiet sigh, happy (though he would never admit it) she had finally dragged him back here to sleep. And it took him a moment to remember that they had a case, exactly which case they had.

"Hey, hey, don't tense up. We're not at work yet." She mumbled her words against his skin.

"There is a _terrorist_ on the loose, Kate. Work doesn't stay at work. You know that." He began to shift away to get up, and cursed (blessed?) her tendency to snuggle close in the mornings.

"I know. But, Jethro… you can't get so fixed on the target. Not like yesterday." She partially covered her face with her arm, and spoke so quietly he almost didn't hear when she continued, "I thought about kissing you out there in the hallway yesterday, just to get you to snap out of it."

"Don't. Don't even think about it."

"I know. Not at work."

He moved to get out of bed again, but she latched onto his arm.

"Hey, do me a favor. Relax a bit again already _before_ we go into work?"

"I won't go at the guy like I did yesterday." He sighed. "And I'm not sure we'll get any more out of him. They really covered their asses."

"Good." A slightly shy smirk spread over her face as she let her arm fall to her side, a glint in her eye. "But that's not what I meant." She stretched, arched her back, and he swallowed.

"Kate, your leg…"

"You have seen me in the gym, right?"

He arched an eyebrow at her. "Am I gonna get smacked like DiNozzo if I say yes?"

"No. I smack him because he's DiNozzo." Her tone lowered, and her "r"s came from somewhere further back in her throat. "You're more than welcome to look."

* * *

They were five minutes late, and while he was more than eager to return to the hunt, he'd admit he wasn't inclined to spring at the throat of everyone who crossed his path—not even the director's flirty assistant who showed up at his desk first thing and said Morrow wanted to see him.

"Sir?" He took a sip of his coffee as he stepped inside the doorway.

"Special Agent Gibbs." Morrow nodded a greeting, and by tacit custom forewent any formalities. "Mossad tells us Haswari has made contact with his handler again. CIA muscled in, and told us to step back."

He didn't attempt to hide his displeasure. "Director—"

Morrow held up a hand, turning his head to the side. "You don't have to tell me. Haswari denies having any knowledge of the bombing backup plan. Mossad apparently believes him, and the CIA is willing to at least give him the benefit of the doubt, too. They want the FBI to take over the investigation into Hamas, and us out of it."

"This bastard _shot_ —" he nearly said _Kate_ "—two of our people!"

"You don't have to tell me that. But we have our orders."

He downed a large gulp of his coffee. "You can't tell me you believe the guy knew nothing about a back-up plan to spring him!"

"Do you have any proof?"

He shook his head, but turned towards the door. "I'll get you your proof. We have a couple of leads on this Bassam guy in the Hamas cell. We'll track him down."

"The case is being transferred to the FBI. You have a new case—a dead Marine fell from a warehouse bathroom ceiling. I've already dispatched a team to secure the scene."

Draining the last of his coffee, he tossed the cup sharply into the trash, setting his jaw and forcing himself to let out his breath slowly. "Yes, sir. I'd like to request Fornell take over the case, though. And I want to speak to him personally."

Morrow nodded. "I'll see what I can do."

Gibbs turned to leave.

"One more thing, Agent Gibbs. Rumor has it you and Agent Todd are… close. Is that true?"

The first thing he felt was fury. He took a moment to turn around, debating how exactly to respond. "I look after all my agents, director. Are you asking if I'm sleeping with her?"

Morrow's expression gave away little. "I have to ask."

He nodded, though it didn't prevent him from frowning. "It's the first I've heard of that particular piece of scuttlebutt. Mind telling me who told you?"

"You know I can't do that. Just give me a clear 'no' and you can go."

He swallowed, and looked Morrow in the eye. "Afraid I can't do that."

The director regarded him for a moment.

"Sir, there have been no problems. It started before she came to work with us."

He watched Morrow's eyebrows rise, briefly. "I still can't keep her on your team, Gibbs."

He inhaled, and grit his teeth, and nodded.

* * *

"DiNozzo! Did you tell the director you thought I was sleeping with Kate?"

"What?! No, of course not!" Tony half-rose from his desk, his brow wrinkled. "But... so you _are_ —"

"Grab your gear—" he cut DiNozzo off, but the nitwit didn't stop talking.

"—sleeping with her?"

He felt Kate's eyes on him.

"Go gas the truck, and check with Ducky to see if he's already on his way to the scene."

"We have a new crime scene, boss? I thought we were still on that Hamas thing." Tony still stared at him quizzically.

"Why are you still here? Did _any_ of what I said sound like a question?"

"Ah, right. On it."

"I already gave him the camera." Kate was quiet when he finally turned to her, her eyes wide and hesitant. "He knows? I didn't say anything."

He swallowed, and lowered his voice, too. "Pick up your things. Pacci needs a new partner."

She nodded, grabbing her bag, and levered herself up.


	32. Chapter 32

"Agent Gibbs." Fornell nodded, once, when he stopped in front of the desk, and held out his hand. "I heard you had a case file for me."

Shifting through the papers on his desk—taking unnecessarily long to do it—he finally pulled the file out, keeping it out of Fornell's reach.

"I want to hear about everything you find out."

"It's an FBI investigation now, Gibbs. Hand it over."

Gibbs narrowed his eyes. "I know you know what it's like, to have one of your agents harmed by some bastard. You heard about the Mossad mole?"

"I'm not making any promises, Gibbs, but we'll do our best to get the guy. Even if it means running afoul of the CIA."

Slowly, he set the file into Fornell's hand.

"Where's Agent Todd?" It was an offhanded question, as he passed her desk. "Heard she can't be walking around much."

"Oh, she was trans—" Tony piped up, then swallowed as he registered Gibbs' glare. "—ferred."

"She is gorgeous, isn't she, Gibbs?" Fornell's smile was practically shit-eating.

"Go do your damn job. Both of you." He didn't bother to hide his scowl as he turned to examine the report in front of him again.

* * *

"Gibbs."

He glanced up. She hovered at the top of the basement steps, tapping one of her crutches on the wooden platform, dressed in one of his t-shirts, the pants leg rolled up above her splint. "You need sleep."

"Not tired, Kate."

"What is that, even? Why are you reading down here?" She carefully set her crutches on the first step, to lower herself onto it, and he closed the folder.

"Kate…"

Stubborn little minx didn't even pay attention to him, so he stood and met her halfway up the stairs.

"Turn around. You're supposed to be resting that leg."

"And you need sleep." She craned her neck to read the label on the file, and he flipped it over in his hand. "Didn't you say you gave that file to Fornell today?" Apparently not fast enough.

"Kept a copy. Up."

She tossed her hair out of her face and stared at him. "I don't believe he didn't know about the bombing plan either. But the FBI are capable, you know."

"So capable they had to come to us to find Colonel Ryan."

Her eyebrows twitched, and was sure she would have folded her arms across her chest, if her arms were free. "You think you would've been better at it if you didn't know him personally, if he didn't trust you?"

He held her gaze. "Guess we'll never know, will we?"

"Come up. You can read a file in bed, too." It was a sigh.


	33. Chapter 33

Abby slipped into the bullpen, balancing a cafeteria tray laden with enough food for two, and set it down on Kate's new desk.

"Oh, hey." Kate grinned when she glanced up. "Thanks. I was just about to head down there."

The bullpen was a little quieter than usual, with half the agents gone for their respective lunch hours, or hoping to catch suspects during theirs. "Thought I'd save you a little walk."

"More like a long one." Kate's smile was rueful. "Thank you."

"I thought you got that walking cast-boot thing now that they took your stitches out." Abby grabbed the cup of Caf-Pow from the tray and took a long sip.

"They did." Kate rolled partially around the desk in her chair so Abby could see, and snagged a french fry. "But I'm still trying to keep weight off it when I can, and it's not exactly easy to walk in this thing, either. You've never had a broken bone before?"

Abby tilted her head slightly, taking a moment to reply. "No, but I dislocated my shoulder once."

"Ouch." Kate grimaced. "Not exactly the same healing process, though, Abs. …Do I even want to know what you were doing?"

"I don't know, do you?"

Picking up the fork, Kate glanced at her friend out of the corner of her eyes as she reached for her chicken salad.

"How about we take that as a no?" Abby grinned and began to unwrap her burger. "So how was your first case under Pacci?"

"Lots of going through files. Not like I wouldn't be on desk duty with Gibbs, either. And Pacci's not bad. We got the guy in the end, for stealing government funds. He was going to start a meth lab in his basement as part of his 'retirement plan' and wanted some 'start-up capital'." She shook her head, and lifted a bite to her mouth.

"I heard that was you who got the confession out of him."

She lifted one shoulder, swallowing, though she couldn't help the proud little smile that crept across her lips. "Pacci wanted me to try, you know, to see what I'd picked up from Gibbs."

Abby lowered her voice, glancing at the empty desk beside Kate's. "Or, he's really bad at interrogating people and he knows it."

Kate lowered her voice equally, arching one eyebrow. "I'm not going to say that about my new boss. He's a good investigator."

"Yeah, but he's about as intimidating as a wet puppy, once you get past the bear bulk and talk to the guy for five minutes. Even with you leg banged up, you're still ten times as scary as he is. "

"I'll assume that was meant to be a compliment." Kate attempted to spear several lettuce leaves that insisted on sliding away from her, slippery with dressing. "But actually, I think my completely non-threatening status right now was what helped me get a confession. The guy seemed to think I wouldn't notice the details, that I was too timid to hurt a fly or something."

"So your amazing powers of exposing the truth will go away once that's off? Damn. Can I get the magic cast when you're done with it?"

"Please don't tell me you need help getting something out of McGee. The guy's an open book."

"Oh, no, of course not." Abby looked vaguely insulted. "But it would still be cool, to have a cast like that."

"You can have it if you want, though it'll hardly fit on your lab wall."

"Oh, I hadn't planned on hanging it up." Abby took a large bite out of her burger and licked a stray dollop of ketchup off her lip.

"Let's file the details under the category of 'things you can keep to yourself'." Kate smiled as she said it, though. "How are Gibbs—Je—" she started to correct herself, and stopped; she really could call him "Jethro" whenever she felt like now, but it occurred to her that he still might not appreciate it at work, "—and Tony doing?"

"They got their guy. Turns out it was a prank gone really wrong; this one guy used it as an excuse to run over his buddy so he could steal his money."

"I heard _that_ from Gibbs already." She arched her eyebrows, tilted her head, and watched as Abby chewed, swallowed, and sighed.

"Tony says he's grumpy. A lot. I mean, he is. He's okay, but he doesn't bring me Caf-Pow as often, and he's all business. And everything takes longer than it used to. They probably could've solved it last week if they'd had you around."

"You really don't need to flatter me, Abby, and you're no good at it."

"Kate!" she protested,"That was a scientific statement of fact, not 'flattery'. Statistically, with one person missing from a three-man team, the same amount of work is going to take one hundred and fifty percent of the time it used to need to be completed. And they do miss you."

"Are you sure Tony isn't just complaining because now he has to go through all the files I used to get stuck with?"

Abby smiled and tilted her head to the side. "Well, you might have a point there."


	34. Chapter 34

"Pacci, I need Kate."

It had been something of a surprise how, despite the wide open shared space, most teams interacted little with each other in the bullpen. So she turned, intrigued (ignoring how her heart still sped up sometimes) and watched as Gibbs intruded into "their" space.

Her new boss squared off with her old. "You can't just come in and just take my agent, Gibbs. We have a case right now. I need her. Actually, I could use your opinion on it, too, but I know you're busy. Give me the same respect."

"Not—you think I wouldn't come here without a good reason, Pacci?" Gibbs tilted his head, his tone tense. "I need a protection detail set up, and she's the best we've got. We have a guy who murdered his wife on the loose, and I don't want anything to happen to the kid."

"Have you taken a _look_ at your girlfriend, Gibbs? She's still recovering from the last time she protected someone." Pacci had balls, and he was generally a good guy, even if they were still learning how to work together.

"Can you two do me the favor of not talking about me like I'm not sitting right here?" It was nice being a valued resource, but at the same time it felt more like two pit bulls fighting over a bone—herself being the bone.

"Yes, I have—" Gibbs paused, narrowing his eyes. "I've taken a whole damn lotta looks at Kate, actually. And she's not going to be _carrying out_ the detail, just planning it."  
She sighed and sat back.

It was hardly a secret why she'd been transferred under Pacci, and Gibbs' trademark glares at anyone who mentioned it in his presence really only confirmed it, and yet their pattern hadn't really changed. He swiped her coffee in the mornings, and she didn't eat lunch with him, and she only spoke about it with Abby, and he didn't seem to talk about it either.

Pacci turned, and nodded to her. "I'll head out and see if I can find a good spot to set up surveillance. You spend the afternoon with him and his detail."

She nodded, slowly rising. "It shouldn't take longer than a few hours, Chris. If I'm done before you get back, I'll dig a little deeper for anything I can find on Voss."

Pacci pulled on his coat, and she accompanied Gibbs to "his" little square of the bullpen. "I'll need blueprints of the house and the surrounding area."

"'Chris'? You two on a first-name basis already?"

She glanced at him, perplexed. "Everyone calls me Kate. And he's really more a partner than a boss, especially since it's only the two of us. What's actually weird is how everyone here only calls you Gibbs—you know, what is up with that?"

"DiNozzo! Pull up the floor plan on the screen, will you?"

She rolled her eyes and began to examine the elderly couple's house.

* * *

"It's Commander Foley's wife. He's going after Mrs. Foley."

"Well, you can't leave her in danger like that." She was standing beside her desk, trying to get used to the walking cast, and she dropped her hand to her side when Gibbs snatched the coffee she was holding without so much as a "thank you".

"I know we can't. But we have to take Curtin back into custody, at least until he's cleared of murder." He took several long gulps of her drink.

"But you've already contacted her, right?"

Gibbs nodded. "DiNozzo and McGee left to pick her up, and they'll bring her back here until we figure out what to do."

She grabbed her coffee back—she had started to get used to the stronger stuff, and he didn't grimace quite as much when he tasted milk and sugar anymore—and took a sip before setting it down on the desk. "What you really need is a decoy."

He raised his eyebrows. "And where do you suggest I get that?"

"Well, what does she look like?"

He frowned, and narrowed his eyes at her for a moment before he turned. "Go work your own case, Kate."

"You could get one of the agents here to do it." She followed him towards the elevator.

" _Kate_ …"

He said her name like it said everything, and sometimes she wished he would use regular words. "Look, Gibbs, I'm just trying to help."

"Help with what, Katie-Cat?" Tony emerged from the elevator, gently gripping the upper arm of a petite, dark-haired woman. "Should I take her to interrogation, boss?"

"Room 3. Now." Gibbs moved to accompany him. "Where's McGee?"

"Uh, he went to go see Abby, to deliver a few things we bagged and tagged." Tony glanced briefly over his shoulder.

"That's Mrs. Foley?" She did her best to walk alongside him, mentally cataloging the female agents she knew. "You know, she kind of looks like me. Vaguely. I mean, if you didn't get within maybe ten feet..."

"This isn't your case." He lengthened his stride, and she glared at him as she fell behind.

"I could be your decoy."

"Not happening." He didn't stop or look at her.

"Do you have a better plan?"

He practically growled as he disappeared into interrogation. "I'll come up with one."

* * *

Voices wafted over from the cubicle behind her as she turned off her computer for the day.

Tony was sticking up for himself. "C'mon, boss, you think he won't have been watching her house? You think he's going to go in there when he knows the house is empty?"

"We don't know whether or not he has." Gibbs was still growling.

"We know he's smart. We should assume he has." McGee was still here, too, apparently.

She adjusted her bag on back and slowly headed over, sans crutches, to lean on the wall of what used to be her corner of the foursquare work area. "Have you thought any more about my suggestion?"

Gibbs immediately narrowed his eyes at her.

"What was her suggestion?" McGee glanced from her to him and back again.

"To have a stand in for Mrs. Foley, to trap Curtin."

"Well, Mrs. Foley doesn't have a broken leg." It was a little strange to feel Tony's gaze on her again—two, bordering three weeks without had made her more aware of it than before, apparently—but it wasn't his usual lecherous grin.

"She could have broken it today." Kate shrugged. "It would make her a better target, actually, by Curtin's way of thinking."

"And put you in danger. You're still supposed to be behind a desk, Kate." Gibbs was glaring at her, but it only made her grin, now that he wasn't actually her boss anymore.

"It's hardly strenuous. All I'd need to do is sit inside a house. And you guys would be right there." She was so tired of being glued to an office chair, even if she still wasn't so good at walking with this cast yet. "The master bedroom has its own bathroom, right? As well as a walk-in closet, if it's like most houses I've seen. Those are two perfect spots for you guys to wait, if you wanted, and whoever's watching from outside can come in straight from the hallway, or wherever."

"It's not a bad plan. It's the only one we have right now." McGee tilted his head.

Gibbs took several steps closer, staring down at her. "No."

"You're running out of time. Eventually he'll realize she's in custody, and disappear back into the woodwork until he can get another shot at her. He may already have."

"She kind of has a point, boss."

He bristled at Tony's comment. She held his gaze, though she lowered her voice. "Trust me, Gibbs. I can do it. I'm an agent, too, you know. If it was anyone else, you wouldn't hesitate."

" _Anyone else_ does not have a broken leg!"

"Even if they did—" _you'd still use them without a second thought._ She paused, swallowed, letting her gaze skip over McGee and DiNozzo. If this was a fight she wanted to have, she didn't want to have it in front of them. "I know what I can do right now, and what I can't."

"Answer's still no." He turned, tossing his coffee in the trash. "Go home, Kate."

With a sigh and an annoyed set of her jaw, she headed for the elevator.

He didn't return to the house at all that night, and didn't so much as glance at her when she offered him two cups of coffee when she came into the office. She heard from Abby later that day that Tony was tormenting an extremely irritated McGee, who for some reason or other had donned a wig and a red negligée last night, and that Curtin was still at large, though news of Mrs. Foley's arrest had already been publicized.


	35. Chapter 35

She was slinging her backpack over her shoulder when her phone rang.

It was likely something quick, like McGee reporting in about the civilian case files—and when it wasn't, she had to set her free hand on her desk to support herself, and take deep breaths to focus, and process everything the dispatcher was telling her.

Gibbs approached her as she headed towards him, and they met somewhere in the middle outside of their respective cubicles. His face was clouded. "Kate."

"Pacci's dead. I know. Disemboweled, in an elevator." She swallowed, heavily. "He said he was going to surveil Reed this afternoon."

"Who's Reed?"

She turned and headed back to her desk, gesturing for him to follow. "The suspect in our current cold case warmed up. I have a photo…" She began to sift through the stack of papers on her desk as she spoke.

He nodded. "Picture would be useful, to ask people at the scene."

"I'm coming with you."

"I really don't think you want to see this."

It might have been a statement of fact to him, but it still got on her nerves, especially right now, after having been coddled and kept out of things for what felt like ages.

"I'm not some simpering flower, Gibbs." She shoved her shock, her sadness (though she admittedly hadn't known Pacci that well, or that long) into a mental box, and pushed it into a corner for now. "I didn't go with him on surveillance because the cast makes me stick out—" and even if she could hardly have done anything different, it still pricked at her, "—but if you think I'm not going to participate in this investigation, you're wrong."

Finding the photo she had been looking for, she pulled it out of the file and held it out so he could see. "Amanda Reed, the woman he was tailing. I'll fill you in on the way."

He was reaching out to take it. "You give this to me and fill all of us in tomorrow."

She arched an eyebrow at him. "I can look at a crime scene and talk to people, Gibbs. And you'll need me for this investigation, anyways."

"Photo, Kate." He crooked his finger, and she raised her eyebrows as she put it into his hand.

"I'm heading for the truck." She began crossing the distance between her and the elevator, figuring no objection was as good an acquiescence as she was going to get.

* * *

McGee—she really would have called him "Tim" like Abby and the rest of his friends did, but it felt a little weird, considering it still reminded her of Major Kerry now and then, and McGee understood—brought the courthouse files the next day, and stayed to help her go through them while Gibbs and Tony went to finalize the stakeout Pacci had started setting up.

Of course, when they got back, Gibbs wanted to divide up the surveillance shifts between McGee, Tony, and himself.

"No. Absolutely not. Pacci being alone on this is what got him killed. You are not staking her house out by yourself, Gibbs." She crossed her arms, sitting partially on the edge of her desk to keep her weight off her leg.

"What, you want McGee 'protecting' me and Tony on his own?" Derision dripped off his tone.

The other two agents in question hovered by the entrance to the cubicle area, obviously torn between running away and not wanting to seem like they were running away.

"No, I mean I will be participating in the stakeout."

"No. You'd be a liability more than a help if it comes to a confrontation." He eyed her leg pointedly. "I know nobody likes desk duty, but—"

She swallowed and adjusted her arms, to pull a little more tightly to herself. "This isn't about trying to get out of desk duty! This is about safety. And limited backup, or at least someone checking in periodically, is better than nothing." She glanced at Tony. "He was pretty damn grateful McGee was checking in on him when Curtin broke into the house on your last case."

"And what if our culprit decides to shoot at you, too?" His voice was low, his eyes blazing as he crowded further into her space.

She lifted a shoulder. "Well, I don't plan to be in that position. And since LEOs aren't usually out and about with casts on, I doubt they'll see me as a threat."

"This isn't a discussion. It's my investigation, and I'm still saying no." He turned towards the elevators, and she uncrossed her arms to push herself off the desk.

" _Your_ investigation? Since when?"

He turned to glower at her. "Since I heard Pacci died and my team was needed at the crime scene."

"They called me, too. And I was on this case before you were."

"On Pacci's murder case?"

"On the Amanda Reed and Commander Voss case, and considering Pacci swallowed that memory card and the killer wanted to get it, I think it's safe to say the two are connected!"

Anna, the girl in the neighboring cubicle, was glancing at them with her eyebrows raised, and so she tried to lower her voice a little, and unclench her jaw. "I'll head down there with McGee to set everything up and to watch until nineteen-hundred, and you and Tony can take the night shift."

Grabbing her backpack, she nodded to McGee.

Gibbs followed her into the elevator, and pulled McGee out. "You're taking the stairs."

She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall, and he pulled the emergency stop, as she expected.

He was practically glowering, his tone dark and quiet, but he kept to his own side of the metal box. "What makes you think you can question my professional authority, especially in front of other agents?"

"Your professional authority?" She huffed out a mirthless laugh, and just barely kept herself from rolling her eyes. "What about mine?"

"I'm the senior agent."

"That doesn't automatically give you complete control over an investigation! Look, I know you're used to having things your way, but I don't work for you anymore. My _partner_ died. You sure wouldn't cede control of an investigation to someone else if you were in my shoes, so don't give me any crap for it."

He blinked, once, and shifted his jaw.  
 _"Romance between agents never works, Kate."_ She tensed as the memory flared, briefly, and closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the wall.

"Just give me a little respect here. I know you know how to share jurisdiction."

She heard the soft scuff of his soles on the floor as he came closer. "I don't want you anywhere near whoever killed Pacci."

"I'm not getting close. I don't have a death wish. But I'm tired of doing nothing but paperwork, and if I'm going to be sitting around, I can sit around in a car or an apartment, too."

"You need to be patient and let it heal." His voice sounded slightly hoarse. She kept her eyes closed.

"This isn't just about my leg, and you know it."

He sighed. "What do you want from me? I'm not going to agree to a decision I _don't_ agree with."

She bit her lip, and slowly opened her eyes. He wasn't crowding her, but she could tell by the tension in his shoulders that he wanted to, that he wanted to step closer and pin her with his steely gaze. "Just… ask yourself how you'd act if it were Tony."

"If it were Tony, we wouldn't even be _having_ this conversation, because his ass would be out the door already! What are you trying to accuse me of, Agent Todd?"

She swallowed, and took a deep breath. "I don't work for you anymore, Gibbs. And my welfare is not your responsibility. If I think I can do something, let me do it."

"I'm not going to _not_ think about keeping you out of harm's way." There was gravel, a quaver in his voice she couldn't quite pin down.

She met his stare. "It's part of the job. You can't—you won't be able to keep me out of danger all the time. Besides, you didn't care this much before." She paused, sucking in a breath. " _All_ I'm asking is to sit somewhere and keep another set of eyes on her along with the rest of you, and to be treated like the autonomous field agent I am."

He continued to gaze at her, though she could read nothing on him, and his mind seemed miles away.

Several seconds ticked by, silence underlined by the quiet buzz of the fluorescent lights.

"Gibbs?" She cleared her throat, held out her hand. "Our team?"

He blinked, and slowly exhaled. "You take your shift with me."

She raised her eyebrows, and smiled hesitantly. "You know what that will look like, right?"

"Do I look like I give a damn?"

She shook her head. "All right."

He reached out to clasp her hand, firmly.

* * *

 **A.N.: Yes, I know this is mostly case stuff and I think most of you are here for the Kibbs. But it was kind of important to me that she get out from under his shadow at work, at least somewhat. Hopefully this helped to accomplish that.**


	36. Chapter 36

"You wanted to see me, Director?" He knocked on the doorframe, leaning in past the open door.

Morrow nodded, and stood. "Glad to hear you caught Pacci's killer."

"So'm I." He was sure his displeasure that he had been forced to catch anyone, his disdain for the scumbag lying in the morgue, showed on his face.

"The funeral will be on Saturday."

He just nodded in response. "Was that what you called me in here for, sir?"

"How did you do with Agent Todd on the Voss case?" Morrow clasped his hands in front of him, and Gibbs straightened under his gaze.

"Fine, sir. No problems." And there hadn't been. Sure, she had hated being cooped up in the apartment—he could tell even if she never said anything—but she hadn't pushed any further. She had loosened up a little once they were out of the office, and he couldn't say he really blamed her.

"I heard there was a loud _discussion_ at one point."

"She objected to it being 'my' investigation." And damn, it had pissed him off then. "Considering she had been working with Pacci on tracking Voss down already. She hasn't been neutered in the slightest." The director cracked the smallest of grins, one he was sure mirrored his own. "We sorted it out."

"What was the result?"

"Got some practice sharing an investigation." He lifted one shoulder. "Not so bad, as far as it went."

"And Agent Todd? Speaking professionally, as an agent? Do you think she'd be able to investigate on her own, once she can work in the field again?" Morrow had an excellent poker face, when he wanted to.

He didn't have to think about it. "Kate is more than capable. Could use more experience, though."

"Could she train a probie?"

"Most likely, but I wouldn't give her one just yet, sir."

Morrow nodded. "I had asked Pacci for a report on her performance, but…" His spread hands said it all.

He nodded, waiting for a moment. "Was that all, sir?"

"Agent McGee will be transferring here as a probationary field agent. I want him to work with you."

"Noted."

Morrow began to sift through the papers on his desk. "If I end up having to assign Agent Todd to assist you while she is still on desk duty, you are working _with_ her—she is not your subordinate. I don't want any further possibility of the accusation of ethics violations."

"Understood."

Morrow nodded and returned to his office chair. "That was all I wanted to discuss, Agent Gibbs."

He didn't know whether to be relieved or annoyed when she wasn't assigned to work with him, instead cycling among the other agents in HQ, putting together backgrounds and profiles and helping with interrogations as needed.

"It's interesting, to see all these different cases, and how different agents interrogate suspects, but I have to say I miss having a team," she said to him one evening, over a plate of pasta and chicken, twirling a small glass filled with wine in her hands. "I will be so happy to get this cast off next week."

"Can't say you'll be the only one." He smirked slightly to himself, because as much as he liked sex with her in any form, Kate on top of him offered delectable visuals.

"Yeah, I bet you'll be happy to have a little more space again." She took a sip, licking a stray drop of wine off her lips. "Thank you, again, for letting me stay here."

"Nothing you have to thank me for, Katie."

He'd gotten used to her eventually asking him to turn off the light and lie down with her, and maybe the extra sleep did him good (though he'd still never pass up coffee). Maybe he didn't make her ask quite as often anymore.

"You'll be going back to your apartment after you get it off, then?" He stole a sip of her wine; she watched him with an amused smile.

"It'll be nice to be home. In my own space, if that makes any sense." She glanced around with a small smile. "Not that I don't like being here—but it's still your house."

He followed her gaze over the wooden furniture, the bare walls, the lack of pictures or knicknacks. Maybe it was kind of utilitarian—fine, spartan—but he'd never really minded.

"You telling me these are still your guest manners?" He arched an eyebrow in play consternation, eyeing the oversized t-shirt she had stolen from his closet and both feet propped up on the chair between them.

She laughed, dipping her head, and made no move to take her good leg down. "Not quite."

He hadn't realized before how much it mattered to him that she was comfortable around him. "Good."


	37. Chapter 37

Gibbs dropped his customary kiss on her cheek as he slid into the passenger seat of her convertible. "Hey, Vanessa."

"It's V to you, and you know it." She smiled, eyeing him as she pulled away from the curb. "What's going on? You said two weeks ago you weren't sure if you'd have time, and then suddenly you call me on Friday and nothing I say will deter you."

He shook his head, doing his best to keep from breaking into a grin. "Why does anything have to be going on?"

She did have a nice smile, but the red curls didn't do quite as much for him as they used to. "Because that's the only time you ask to see me. Otherwise it's touch and go, 'don't plan on it,' 'ask me the night of, because I can't say in advance whether or not I'll have a case.' I know you, Jethro."

"'Course you do."

"So spill." She turned a corner, sharply—she could have taken driving lessons from DiNozzo—and he sighed and relaxed into the seat.

"Kate got her cast off yesterday."

She waited a moment, then prompted, a little loudly and obviously over-enunciating: "Wow, that sure sounds like a problem."

"She's not staying with me anymore."

They came to a screeching halt at a red light, and she glanced at him with a low whistle. "I'm not coming home with you, not matter how much you beg. I'm pretty sure William would have an issue with that."

He returned her glance, slightly crossly, though he tamed his scowl. "I wasn't asking."

She grinned as she stepped on the gas again. "I know. But you don't want to go home and be alone again, am I right? It feels empty."

"Yes." He let a little more of his displeasure seep into the words he gritted through his teeth.

A little of the teasing left her tone. "Why didn't you just tell her she didn't have to leave?"

He shifted his jaw. "Haven't exactly been together that long. She seemed to want to go home."

"And you thought you'd be okay with it."

"Yeah." There was nothing really funny, but he attempted a laugh anyway.

"I'm gonna guess you want to head straight to the bourbon when we get to the bar, but get something to eat first."

"Yes, mother."

She lifted one hand from the wheel slightly to nudge him with her elbow.

The buildings streaked by unnoticed for several seconds, slowly morphing into countryside, before Vanessa spoke again, quietly. "She's really thrown you for a loop, hasn't she?"

"You could say that." He propped his elbow on the door. "She doesn't just take things sitting down, not even orders half the time, and she can be annoying as hell. But I can't stay pissed at her and she doesn't seem to mind me that much."

"High praise," she laughed. "You know, you were practically glowing when I picked you up from the airport that night. You were grinning like the cat that ate the canary."

"You gonna bring that up every time I mention her name? I just saved the president; I had every damn right to be a little proud of myself." She would see through his grumbling, he knew, but he couldn't _not_ protest, either.

"You're full of it. That wasn't pride."

"Worth a shot." He lifted a shoulder.

"You want her, Gibbs, show her. You never had any problems with that before. Or was it because you used to be able to squint a little and playact it was Shannon?"

"Don't bring out your amateur psychologist shit again." He hid none of his anger this time.

"Sorry, that was too far." She lifted one hand from the wheel, palm flat, as she glanced at him. "Really, I'm sorry." He knew her well enough to know the apology was genuine.

He turned to watch the scenery, the fringes of Maryland suburbia. Her sigh was barely audible among the wind and the tires on the road.

"You don't think you should want her, is that it? Or maybe you don't think she wants you the same way?"

He tasted both admissions rolling over his tongue, and didn't open his lips.

"Don't tell me you're scared. C'mon, you've never backed down from anything. Or is it because it's working okay now and you don't want to rock the boat? Nothing ever stays the same." Her tone was gentle. "You know that."

"How's Maria?" Vanessa and her husband had adopted an adorable little girl from Venezuela two years ago. It was an overt attempt to change the subject.

Vanessa didn't try to push further. "She's doing well. She's already starting to read, and she's been bugging us about getting a pet iguana."

"Nothing furry?" He glanced at her.

She tilted her head. "William's allergic."

"Ah."

"Yep." She nodded, slowly. "At least she's not asking for a snake or a tarantula."

He snorted a half-laugh. "Yeah, at least you've got that going for you. She hasn't started going on about horses, either." He'd give anything to hear Kelly stumbling over her words from excitement again, though.

"Fingers crossed."

He leaned into the headrest, savoring the lull in the conversation for several moments. "What's brought you down here this time around? Did one of the company's plants blow up again?"

"I'm an engineer, not a safety inspector!" She laughed. "No, actually I'm here overseeing the implementation of a new manufacturing process we recently acquired the patent for. For car door handles, actually…"

He closed his eyes, allowing the corners of his mouth to slant upwards at the feeling of the wind in his hair.

She continued talking, and he knew she knew he wasn't listening, and neither of them really gave a damn.

 _You're allowed to want her now, y'know._ He set about planning, as if it were an interrogation.

Still, she had never been all that amenable to just going along with his plans.

He cornered her the next evening, literally, blocked her exit from behind her desk, when the light in the bullpen was low and most of the cubicles were empty.

"Plans tonight?"

She tilted her head, and arched an eyebrow as she looked up at him. "Not yet. Is that an offer?"

"Yeah. Come home with me."

The soft, pleased smile that spread over her face made him suck in a breath.

"If you can give me fifteen minutes, I'm almost done here, and the rest will wait until morning."

"I'll go ahead and get dinner started." Since they weren't working together anymore, and could be called out independently, they never took one car. He missed it sometimes, being able to watch her relax in the passenger seat and feel her idle smile warming him.

He had just tossed the steaks into the pan when he heard the door open. "That was fast."

"I realized I didn't need all of the fifteen minutes I thought I would." She waltzed into the kitchen on sock-clad feet, and insinuated herself between him and the counter to kiss him, nipping briefly at his bottom lip. He just barely stifled a sound in the back of his throat, and she let out a muted giggle. He wrinkled his nose.

"You still have clothes here, right?" He already knew the answer.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure there's still some clean stuff in the drawer you lent me use of. And if not, I have a change of clothes in my car." She unbuttoned the topmost button of her blouse and rolled her shoulders as she spoke. "Did you start any vegetables with that?"

"There's some broccoli in the fridge, if I remember right."

She checked, and then crouched to retrieve the steamer from his cupboard. "You remember correctly."

"Good."

He waited a beat for her to set the water on to boil, watching, and then made sure his tone was purposely nonchalant as he remarked, "Kinda nice."

"What is?" The wooden cutting board clanked dully on the counter as she set it down.

"This." He gestured vaguely as he speared one of the steaks, and flipped it.

"Dinner? The company? Yes." She rinsed the head of broccoli, holding it under running water over the sink.

He swallowed, and flipped the other steak before he spoke again, the marinade sizzling quietly. "You don't have to go back to staying at your apartment if you don't want to, Katie."

She glanced at him, setting the head of broccoli down on the cutting board, and rested her wrist on the counter. "What do you mean?"

He lifted a shoulder. "You could keep on staying here. If you wanted. It's not like we didn't spend the night together most of the time before, anyways."

He turned his attention deliberately to the meat, sliding it around in the pan a bit, just for something else to focus on besides the way she drew in a sharp breath beside him.

"Are you—asking me if I want to move in? Here?" He could hear every breathless hitch in her voice. When he finally gave in and looked at her, her lips slightly parted, her eyes wide, he fought the urge to kiss her, and took a step back instead, to give her space.

"Sure, that sounds about right."

He watched as she took it in, the momentary lift in her eyebrows, the way her gaze flicked past him, distant, as she processed, the beginnings of a smile playing at the corners of her mouth when she looked back at him. Sliding her hands up onto his shoulders and linking her fingers behind his neck, she bit her lip. "Give me a few days to think about it, before I tell you yes or no for sure?"

It might kill him, waiting, but he still nodded. "Of course."

She stood on tiptoe and tilted his head down to her to kiss him, with a lot of tongue.


	38. Chapter 38

She didn't have to think about it much, really. Her apartment was nice, comfortable, homey-but it wasn't quite home. Still, she decided to wait a few days, stay by herself at night, to see if she got used to living alone again.

She didn't, and, truth be told, she didn't really want to.

So it wasn't hard at all, when she dragged him out of his basement to low-key celebrate closing her first case on her own, to swallow a bite of her pizza and mention, "I brought some extra clothes with me."

He glanced away from the Scrabble board at that, arching his eyebrows before gracing her with one of his quiet, understated smiles. "You planning on staying the night again?"

"Does your offer still stand?" She took a sip of her beer to wet her throat, watching him carefully. "I'd like to take you up on it."

For a moment, he seemed practically insulted, eyebrows together, lips tight, before his expression smoothed again. "Of course I still want you to stay with me."

"I still have another six months on the lease for my apartment." She laid down an F,I,R, and Y around the A in his "adult." "Fairy. Double word score."

"Gives us some time to figure out furniture and whatever else needs changing." He hovered a finger over the letters as he counted up the points, scribbling them down. Kate was in the lead, so far.

"Yes, it makes sense." She picked the piece of ppizza that looked to have the most pepperoni on it out of the ones remaining, and slid it onto her her plate.

Gibbs held his own empty plate out towards her with one hand, as he spelled out "highway" with the other.

He had left "her" space in his dresser and closet and bathroom empty, and that was that.

It was nice to have company at home, though as the weeks passed she found that more often than not she was the first one there in the evenings, if he left the office at night at all. It wasn't as if she had forgotten how he was, but maybe he had been a little more attentive while she was on crutches, and maybe "how he usually was" wasn't quite as present in her consciousness, now that she no longer witnessed his asshole behavior quite as vividly at work.

Still, it wasn't as if she would have seen more of him living on her own—most likely—and she did get it. She pulled her own all-nighters more frequently than she would have liked, but the knowledge that someone's life could hinge on how quickly she put a man behind bars would hardly let her act any differently—and she couldn't say Gibbs hadn't prepared her for it.

But there were moments it irked her, chief among them being the fact that, when they were in the house at the same time, he more often than not either had his nose buried in a file or his hands on his boat.

"If you don't want to watch this, just say so." She tried to keep any annoyance out of her tone as she glanced away from one Captain Jack Sparrow enacting a harebrained escape plan.

Gibbs barely lifted an eyebrow and just spared her the briefest of glances before he focused on the file in his hand, a file that was now almost as familiar to her as it had to be to him. "Thought you wanted to watch it. 'S not bad, so far."

"I've already seen it." She reached for her water glass on the end table. "But if you want to just focus on—on _that_... feel free." Some of her irritation refused to be held at bay.

He looked at her now, longer. "Is there a problem?"

Closing her eyes, she took a sip of her water. "Look, I'm trying to be patient, but you being here without fully _being_ here—mentally—it's starting to get old. Just because we live in the same place doesn't actually mean we're spending time together."

"What do you want me to do?" He didn't close the folder, his tone hard. "We just got a new lead on this."

"There is no ' _we,_ ' because the last I remembered that was not your case. You told Fornell about the guy matching Bassam's description purchasing guns from that rogue ATF agent?"

"Of course I did. What kind of agent do you take me for, Kate?"

She eyed him, frankly. "Someone who has to be in control. Who hates trusting other people and has become borderline obsessed with this guy."

He swallowed, heavily, narrowing his eyes slightly at her, and said nothing.

"Like I said, I'm trying to be patient, but I don't like seeing this side of you take over. You know, if anyone has a right to be obsessed with catching Haswari, it's me. _I'm_ the one who took a bullet to the leg."

"Then you should understand."

"No, that's exactly it: I still don't. He's taking over your life, and I bet he couldn't be happier, wherever the hell he is, if he knew he was costing you sleep and peace of mind and time with the people you love."

It hit her, in that moment, that he'd never actually said anything about loving her.

She hadn't raised her voice, but her tone held steel all the same, and it did nothing to crack the ice in his eyes.

Draining her glass, she rose and turned towards the hall. "Let me know when you're ready to pretend I'm a priority for you again."

It was a dirty blow, she knew—she hoped—but she couldn't find it in her to take it back.

He didn't follow her, but the ruckus from the TV screen fell silent.

Later, she wasn't sure if the half-remembered kiss on her forehead, the murmured "You are important to me," were just the products of her wishful imagination, but she woke to his arms around her, and contented herself with that.


	39. Chapter 39

**A.N.: Many thanks go to LostatDownton at this point, for reassuring me the rest of this story (namely, the ending) wasn't complete crap like I feared it was.**

* * *

She almost turned at the hand placed familiarly on her hip in line at DC Beans, an indignant sneer on her face, because it most definitely wasn't Gibbs'.

"Get your—"

And then he bent down his voice a whisper, a familiar one that chilled her. "Now, Caitlin, I don't think you want to make a fuss." Metal pressed into the small of her back. "It's quite crowded in here. Imagine how many people might be injured if my weapon were to be fired."

She lifted her chin, gritting her teeth, and dropped her bag beside the nearest chair. She'd want her hands free.

His amused sigh feathered over her neck as he gently applied pressure on her hip to steer her towards the door. In a voice that was (to her) obviously for show, he said, "Darling, I brought you coffee this morning. Come join me."

She held herself silently, stiffly, and leaned as far away from him as possibly as he guided her discreetly down the street, her heart racing. Her first instinct was to grab for her Sig and plant a bullet between his eyes the first chance she got, but her second was to wait it out and figure out what he wanted. _Officially_ , it also occurred to her, he was still a friendly agent. _Friendly_ —she scoffed inwardly at that.

He led her to a deserted back lot in between buildings, a sleek red car the only occupant besides themselves. The hard pressure of metal was lifted there, and as she turned, he visibly lowered his weapon. "I am not here to fight you, Caitlin. I need your assistance, but I did not wish to cause a scene."

"You. Need _me_? And you think I'm going to help _you_ with _anything_?" She didn't care to keep her voice down, though she wasn't shouting.

"I did not know about the bomb. I swear this." He added a little sorrow to the tilt of his lips, a little indecipherable emotion to his brown eyes.

She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head to the side, pushing her breath out through her nose. "Why don't I believe you?"

Her hand was on her Sig, halfway out of its holster, when he trained the gun on her again.

"Please do not do that, Caitlin. I should have to shoot you, and that would be a shame."

"You already did shoot me, once." But she stilled her hand.

His lips twitched into the faintest resemblance of a smile. "I am not sure it was entirely my fault that the gun went off. Unlike your shots."

She didn't lose her grip on her gun, though narrowing her eyes at him again. "What do you want with me?"

"I am not going to tell you here. Please, in the car." He dipped his head to indicate the red vehicle behind her.

"Do you really think I'm that stupid?"

His amused smile widened, just a little. "I think you are curious, and I think you also believe that you have a duty to see what I am—rather, what we are planning, if you can. And you are brave. You will not shrink from a challenge."

She couldn't help that her eyes flicked away from his, for just a moment, or that she swallowed, her throat suddenly feeling very dry.

He hadn't moved when she met his eyes again, and she set her jaw and slowly turned to the face the car.


	40. Chapter 40

" _Kate_!" The rapid beat of his heart forced him out of his dream, though the image of that red hole in the center of Kate's forehead would likely remain forever imprinted on his memory.

McGee and Abby stepped back in unison, their eyes wide.

"Gibbs! I—we weren't sure whether or not we should wake you." Abby spoke first.

"What time is it?" He scrunched his eyes closed, slowly rolling his head to stretch out the kinks in his neck and shoulders.

"Nine in the morning." Abby offered him one of her nervous smiles.

"Then of _course_ you should have woken me!" He squinted at the contents of the file in his lap, some of which had apparently fallen to the floor at some point. Bending down, he snatched them off the ground and shoved the whole lot at McGee. "Put these back in order."

McGee struggled to keep all the papers from falling out of the file again as he quickly caught the bundle. "Right away, si—uh, boss."

Standing, Gibbs turned to head for the elevator, for the restroom and coffee—and then stopped, one finger raised. "What if... we have the timeline out of order? What if the victim was murdered in that barn—and then that blonde with McEvans at the café was her sister?"

McGee paused a moment, his gaze darting up towards the ceiling for a split second as he thought it over, and then he nodded. "That's definitely a possibility. It would fit the evidence."

Maybe Kate wasn't always so far off the mark about sleep being helpful. "We're bringing the sister in again." He whirled, stalking to his desk to grab his coat off his chair. They could stop for coffee on the way, and get a decent brew instead of the sludge in the office machines. "Where's DiNozzo?"

"Right here, boss, so sorry I'm late. There was this really hot—" Gibbs turned to glare at his agent who was just setting down his things at his desk, and Tony clamped his mouth shut.

"Uh, coffee, boss?"

Gibbs stared at the offering with some mistrust, but a sniff told him it hadn't been adulterated with anything, and he finally took a long gulp. "Grab your gear and come with me. We're bringing in the sister." He turned and headed towards the elevator as he spoke.

"The sister? I thought we cleared her—"

"I'll explain to you _in the car_ , DiNozzo."

On the way down, he pulled out his cell to call Kate. He'd never admit he had stayed at the office to avoid her last night, but he knew she'd try to pry the file away from him at some point, all quiet and slightly sullen and still far more distracting (attractive) than anyone had any right to be.

With a little luck, he could make it up to her with a short lunch (and he promised himself to leave the terrorist's file in the car this time).

But she didn't pick up—probably out questioning a suspect—and he tried to ignore the coil of worry that settled in his gut as he left the elevator.


	41. Chapter 41

"God, you drive even worse than Gibbs or Tony." She grimaced, and fought the instinct to cling to something.

"You don't like speed, Caitlin? It doesn't thrill you? Make you feel alive?" Grinning, he didn't take his eyes off the road, and she was grateful for at least that small mercy.

"Not particularly, no."

He made a small, thoughtful noise in his throat, and didn't slow down in the slightest.

The landscape flashed by, the concrete and gray of DC giving way to tarmac snaking through suburbia and then through the countryside.

She remained silent for a while, trying to get a sense where they were headed.

"All right, tell me now." She crossed her arms. "We're alone. You have a captive audience."

"I need you to tell me how to identify Marine One."

She inhaled sharply. "If you think—"

"Not _actually_ tell me. But this is why I am kidnapping you, to show the others how much effort I am putting into this operation, so they will not suspect me when it fails. I am not your enemy, Caitlin."

"What's the operation? Another assassination attempt?"

"I would have thought that would be obvious."

" _Specifically_." She didn't try to keep the bite out of her tone.

"I will have you notify the relevant people after my team has left, when they will have reached their destinations and begun setting up. They are smart, and well-trained. You will not catch them if the areas are being watched in advance." He leaned into a curve in the highway, and she was pressed against the door.

 _My team._ The term unnerved her.

"You'll get pulled over at this speed."

"Do you see patrolmen? And the plates are not traceable to me or this vehicle." His voice was practically a monotone.

The road was, sadly, quite empty.

Her phone rang on her belt, startling both of them.

"Do not pick up." He glanced at her, briefly.

"Why not?" She hovered her hand over her cell. "I'm not a hostage, am I?"

"You should appear to be one. Besides, I do not want any federal agents more involved than necessary."

She narrowed her eyes. "People are going to worry if I don't answer."

"You work alone, do you not? You should not need to answer to anyone for a few hours at least. You could be working on a case." His tone was light, placating.

"I usually answer my phone." She unclipped it, flipped it open—and it fell silent.

 _One missed call from Jethro Gibbs_ , the screen declared.

"Your boyfriend?" She looked up, catching him returning his gaze to the road, a smirk on his face.

She set her jaw. "Yes."

"I have heard much about him. You met on Air Force One, right? He used to be your boss."

"It's actually none of your business."

His smile broadened.

She settled into an exasperated sort of silence, staring out the window, when he refused to tell her what the plan was, until they turned into a small dirt road off the highway, and rolled to a stop.

"What now?" She crossed her arms, and turned to face him.

"Now, you give me your gun, and I will put a hood over your head. You must seem to be a hostage."

Foreboding that filled her gut. "What's the difference between that and actually being a hostage?"

He tilted his head to the side. "Very little, I suppose, besides your knowledge that I will treat you with dignity. Your gun, please."

She opened the door, "For air," she mentioned, but also to give herself some kind of escape route, her mind spinning. "You could have come to me through official channels, to actually plan this."

"Since when does Mossad work closely with NCIS?" He sounded so damn sensible, in that even tone of his. "Besides, the kidnapping should seem realistic, don't you think?"

"I _can_ act."

He let out the briefest semblance of a laugh. "I have not seen it."

"I've had no reason to act around you." Hearing herself, she realized more of her tension was evident in her tone than she had really intended to let on.

"Should I be flattered?" He frowned, slightly, and held out his hand, his tone more insistent. "Your gun."

"Tell me the plan." She took a deep breath. "First. All of it. Then I'll give you my gun and my phone."

His eyebrows twitched, and then he exhaled. "When the helicopter convoy is fired upon, the procedure is to enact an emergency landing, is it not?" He didn't wait for a response, though she swallowed and stilled her instinctive nod. "They will fly along the Potomac until they reach Bear Island—that route is always the same. At one point, there is only one field nearby where the helos can land as a unit. There, my team will disable the helicopters and capture Bush and Sharon—rather, that is the plan as I have relayed it to my men."

He kept his eyes on her, steadily, and she narrowed her own as she watched him right back, thinking it through.

"Why do they want to capture the president? I thought you said this was an assassination attempt."

"They wish to demand an exchange of prisoners—the release of Hamas members in Israel and Al-Qaeda members in Guantanamo Bay for the safe return of your president and my prime minister. When their demands have been carried out, they plan to kill them anyways."

She shook her head. "But that will never happen. Wait—this is a joint operation?"

"Yes. This one only. I am in charge. If it succeeds, I will enter Al-Qaeda."

Kate frowned. "But I thought you intended for it to fail."

"When it fails, I will frame someone else as a Mossad mole, that I caught. They can hardly blame me for that, and they need members and strategists."

Unwillingly, she had to admit how thoroughly he seemed to have thought everything through.

"Caitlin, your gun? We have plenty of time to alert your friends still; the president will not depart the White House until seven PM this evening. My time, however, is running out. They expect me back at the base soon."

With a scowl, she reached for the glove compartment in front of her. "I'll put my gun in here." Where she could still somewhat reach it, that was the idea, and she was sure he knew it, too.

"That is fine. There is a loose hood and some rope in there, as well. I will bind your hands in front of you."

She didn't hide her grimace. "I can't believe I'm actually doing this—actually _trusting_ you."

But she'd done it before, thrown her lot in on a risky gamble, on Alpha Foxtrot 29000, when the stakes were high and the now was what counted.

"How did you know—how did you know I knew you were a mole?"

"My handler. She was quite irate when I contacted her again, after I left the hospital. She had said there was already a plan in negotiation with the Americans to get me out, that I should have waited. She calmed a little when I told her I knew nothing of either plan—but I took the opportunity offered to escape with my cover mostly intact." He smiled, slightly, and she couldn't tell if it was self-satisfaction or fondness for this woman of whom he was speaking, or both—and he was tactful enough to not try to remind her of the bombing.

She wasn't even sure what to believe anymore.

Swallowing heavily, Kate unlatched the glove compartment, and it fell open in front of her. A black hood and a coil of thin cord laid on top, and she picked them up, causing the papers beneath to shift.

"Files?" She shifted some of them in order to be able to close the compartment again. "You're worse than—"

Her throat closed up as the photo paper-clipped to one of the folders caught her eye. "—Where did you get this?"

His hand went to his gun as she drew her own and leveled it at him, and she knew the answer before she spoke. " _Where_ did you get that photo?"

He hesitated a bit too long before he responded. "One of my associates had it—I do not know why—but I asked him for it when I saw it. I—assumed you would like to have it back. I was going to give it to you, this evening, when I dropped you off again."

Those little pauses—just a little too long, abnormal for his usual self-assured manner of speech—gave him away, and she pulled the trigger and watched as he suddenly slumped forward. A speck of brain matter landed on the driver's side window, and after a moment blood began to run down the gearstick, and she stepped out of the car, taking a deep breath.

Inside, from the picture atop the manila folder, Kate smiled up at the windshield, "XO - Your Rosie" scribbled in black ink across her collarbone and the cherry blossoms behind her.

Outside, Agent Todd unclipped her phone from her belt, bracing her elbows on the hood as the ringtone echoed in her ear.


	42. Chapter 42

"Kate, can't this wait? I'm about to interrogate a suspect." He didn't bother to hide his exasperation—but at least she had caught him right outside the interrogation room.

"No, it really can't. I need a GPS trace on my phone. See if there are any remote properties nearby that could be used as a base for a terrorist cell. " Tension vibrated in her voice.

His heart slammed into his ribcage and he turned, lifting his hand off the door. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Not a scratch. If you find a property you think would fit the description, investigate. But I don't know how many might be there."

He pushed open the door to the observation room, gesturing to his two startled subordinates to follow. "When I get my hands on that bastard—"

"He's dead!" she shouted, and he suddenly wondered how far away from crying she was. "I just shot him. Gibbs, I need you to get your head out of your ass for ten minutes—can you do that? Or give me McGee on the phone."

"McGee! Go down to Abby, get a trace on Agent Todd's cell."

"Uh, yes, boss." He blinked, and headed towards the elevators.

"Where are you?" Gibbs barked into the phone, over Tony's excited "What's going on, boss?"

"I don't know, otherwise I wouldn't have asked for a GPS trace. Somewhere in Maryland. Last sign I saw was Gaithersberg. Send a CSRU to my location once you figure it out. Dirt road, just off some highway. Motor vehicle, one body. Haswari."

He fought the urge to grind his teeth. "What happened?"

"I've got to go, Gibbs. Secret Service are calling me back."

The line went dead. He stared at his phone, and then he did let out a growl as he headed down to the lab. "I want that location, McGee!"

* * *

He drove ahead of the NCIS CSRU truck, to find her still on her phone, pacing. She gestured to the car. "I don't know how accurate this information is. Yes, he's a known Mossad mole, but I have reason to believe he may have been a double agent."

A pause, and he ducked to glance inside the car. Blood had begun to soak into the upholstery, though the car was otherwise pristine. A hood and rope lay on the dashboard, and then he picked up the folder on top of the stack in the glove compartment, and retreated again.

"Yes, that's all from my side. Of course, Marcy, don't hesitate to call if you think I might be of any more help."

She flipped her phone closed, and he held up the photo for her to see.

" _Rosie_? " He tilted his head slightly, setting his jaw. "Tell me this isn't what I think it is."

She swallowed, heavily, her gaze glued to the picture for several seconds. "It was Tim's. Major Kerry's. He took it. 'Rosie'—" She blinked, glanced up, her tongue darting out to run over her lower lip. "Rosefern was my code name in the Secret Service. It was the first thing he ever heard me called."

He narrowed his eyes, examining her, and allowed his skepticism to come through in his tone. "How'd a Hamas mole get Major Kerry's picture?"

 _She shot him_ , he repeated to himself. _He shot her, and she shot him._ But she had asked him, time and time again, to drop Ari's case, and when she spoke of him being a double agent...

Kate inhaled, loudly. "When Tim asked me to sign it," and there was a hitch on her exhale, "—he told me he wanted to keep it in the breast pocket of his uniform. I think—he must have forgotten to take it out when he dropped it off at the dry cleaners'."

Gibbs narrowed his eyes further, and when she spoke again, it was quiet. "I think—Haswari must have been in Al-Qaeda, then, already."

"And that's—" He paused. _Don't feed a suspect a scenario._

"That's when I shot him. When I realized that." She swallowed. "I—I know it's not evidence." Kate turned, crossing her arms over her chest, and took several steps towards the trees, fallen pine needles rustling under feet. "I don't—God—maybe he was telling the truth—" She whirled again. "Uhm, you should have Abby check the photo for prints. He said he got it from an Al-Qaeda associate, during this mission I assume, but I didn't believe him."

"Agent Gibbs!" He turned, and nodded to the man approaching from the CSRU vehicle.

"Agent Andrews."

"Is that evidence you're holding?"

Gibbs glanced down at the folder he was holding. "Yeah."

"You can't handle this crime scene, Gibbs." Andrews held out a hand. "Where'd you find it?"

He swallowed. It hadn't even occurred to him… "It was on top of that stack of papers in the glove compartment."

He handed over the folder, and Andrews flipped through the contents. "Why's Agent Todd's photo on it?"

"It's a file about her." From what he could tell, from what little he'd seen, and that really pissed him off. "If that terrorist isn't declared the criminal he is—"

"Don't threaten me, Agent Gibbs." Andrews glanced up, frowning, and lifted his chin to indicate Kate. "Go be with your girl. I'll let you take her back to the station, and I'll take her statement when we finish up here."

"She was on the phone when I got here, talking with someone named Marcy. I'm pretty sure that would be Agent Marcy Carruthers of the Secret Service, but you should probably double-check that."

Andrews nodded, still skimming through the file, and Gibbs slowly turned to watch Kate pacing up and down the dirt road again.


	43. Chapter 43

He swallowed, instinctively trying to keep his steps silent and even, as he would when approaching any other situation that contained the possibility of slaughtering him.

"Kate."

She turned, her eyes wide as her gaze darted from him to the crime scene and back. "Right. Of course they'll investigate the shooting—I didn't even think—I should have known. I'm sorry. I know you would have wanted to work it."

"Don't apologize," he grit out. "I thought I taught you that."

"I don't really give a damn about Rule Six right now. And half of the rest are bullshit you didn't always bother to follow yourself." _Rule Twelve._ He had always known that would come to bite him in the ass at some point, but it had been a long while since that was high on his list of priorities.

She clamped her mouth shut, and turned, exhaling slowly. "I'm sorry. Today has been really shitty, but I shouldn't take it out on you."

"'S all right." He hovered. There was no better word for it. He loved fire, but when sparks flew, he had always been terrible at taming the flames. "How are you?"

She ran her hands over her face, combed those stray strands of hair back over her skull. "I don't know. I'll be okay. I'll be more okay when I know for sure whether or not he deserved it."

"That hospital bomb had to have been his plan. It had his MO all over it."

"I know—I know! But it's—we have no hard evidence. Zilch."

"You don't seem okay." His throat was dry.

"Your investigative skills are legendary." The corners of her mouth tightened, twitched up, briefly.

"What happened?"

"He surprised me in the coffee shop this morning, pressed a gun to my back and threatened to start shooting the people there if I didn't cooperate. And then, once we were alone—" She took a deep breath. "He asked for my help. He knew enough to appeal to my curiosity, to offer to share their plans if I went along with it…"

His chest constricted as she spoke, as she expounded upon all the stupid decisions she was forced into, all the moments he could have so easily killed her. But as she spilled it all, her posture slowly loosened, her features relaxing.

Acting on an impulse, he stepped forward and laid a hand on her shoulder, drawing her in to wrap his arms around her. She let out a small noise of surprise, and then relaxed against him.

"You know how ironic it is? You're the one who was crazy about him, and I'm the one who shot him." Her voice was quiet as she rested her head on his shoulder.

"I was _not_ 'crazy about him.'"

"I'm just glad it's over." She paused, took a deep breath. "Promise me you won't do that again?"

He was silent, for several moments. "It's not the first time I've gotten that involved in a case."

"Promise me, Gibbs. Jethro. Please?" She sighed. "It doesn't help. I mean—persistence does. But not so that it consumes every waking moment. He's gone, and I'm happy now, with you," and he was struck by the realization that it was the first time in several days he had touched her, besides curling up beside her in bed, "—but I felt like I lost you, sometimes, and I can't help but think—when's the next one going to come around?"

He swallowed, glancing down at her as she looked up at him. "I'll try."

"Okay," she murmured as she leaned her head against his chest again.


	44. Chapter 44

Kate heaved a sigh as she crossed the suburban street to rap on the window of the navy sedan. "McGee, what are you doing here? That's the third time I've seen you outside of the office today."

He opened the door, and had the decency to look sheepish. "Um, Gibbs—he ordered me to tail you. For practice. I'm not so good at it yet."

"Don't park directly across from the house. And lean back against the seat."

"Uh, thanks." McGee straightened.

"Give me your phone."

He frowned, his eyebrows drawing together and his lips pursing slightly, but he unclipped the device from his belt and handed it over. "Is yours out of battery?"

"No." She smirked, and dialed Gibbs.

"What is it, McGee?" He was obviously grumpy.

She laughed, just a little. "Have you had enough coffee this morning?"

"Kate, why are you calling me from McGee's phone?" He sighed, and she could picture him swiping a hand over his face. "Never mind. That knucklehead…"

"Why is your probie following me around?"

" _Obviously_ , he needs the practice tailing someone."

"Yes, but why me?" She set a hand on her hip. McGee shrank back in his seat.

"You're a safe target."

"Gee, thanks." She shook her head, smiling. "Fine. And this has absolutely nothing to do with what happened a few days ago?"

Silence was her answer. Kate sighed. "I've had a request for a partner in for ages already, Gibbs. And I can take care of myself in the meantime."

"D'you want Tony instead?"

"Oh God, _please_ spare me." She closed her eyes, grimacing. "We'd be arguing so much we'd never get any work done."

"That's what I thought." His tone was undeniably smug.

"I'm giving you and McGee three more days. If I see him after that, I'm going to make use of his talents for my own investigations, since you insist on misappropriating him."

"You can't tell me what to do with my own agent, Kate."

"I'm not. I'm telling you what _I'm_ going to do with him."

She suddenly bit her lip, her gaze darting to McGee. She hadn't quite meant it the way it had sounded. He was watching her with a little more admiration than she really felt she deserved, but then not that many people stood up to Gibbs.

"Good." Gibbs' voice in her ear sounded almost pleased, and then the line went dead.

She glanced at the phone with a frown before flipping it shut and handing it back to McGee. "You heard that?"

"Uh, yes, ma'am."

Her lips twitched in a slight smile. "You're free to call me Kate, but I won't say no to 'ma'am.'"

"Yes, ma'am. Uh, by the way, I don't think I've said it yet—congratulations on helping to save the president. Again."

A smile tickled her lips, but she tamped it down. "That was mostly the Secret Service, and it's just part of the job. Three days, McGee. Otherwise, have your laptop, badge, and service weapon with you." She turned and headed back to her own car.

Kate arched an eyebrow at Gibbs when he came home, sliding a plate of lasagna over the counter towards him when he appeared in the kitchen doorway. "Really? Abusing your probie as a bodyguard?"

"He's practicing tailing. You're a safe target." He had a good poker face, but that little tilt of his head as he retrieved a fork told her otherwise.

"Really, Gibbs? I can take care of myself. I literally _just_ got put back on duty. I'm trying to put all this behind me."

The lab results had come in yesterday, with only her, Major Kerry's, and Haswari's prints on the photograph, lifting a weight off her shoulders.

"Yeah, but what if Ari hadn't tried to trick you into cooperating? Just—kept using deadly force?" Gibbs turned and stabbed his fork into the lasagna. "Food smells good."

"I don't need a bodyguard."

"McGee is not a bodyguard. He doesn't have anything close to the build, or training, or personality." He stuffed a bite into his mouth.

"I meant what I said about making use of him for my own investigations if you don't stop having him tail me."

"All right." He lifted a shoulder and spoke around the food, gesturing to the lasagna. "This is really good."

She sighed as he picked up his plate and headed into the dining room, and smiled as she followed him, knowing she was hardly going to get anything else out of him, at least at the moment.

The tail didn't stop, so when the navy sedan parked a short ways down the street from the suspect's house, and she approached, McGee had already rolled down the window with a sheepish half-smile. "Sorry, Kate. Orders."

She crossed her arms. "Do you have your Sig?"

"Yes, ma'am, I do."

"Get out, then." She tilted her head towards the suspect's house. "You're coming with me."


	45. Chapter 45

_A year or two later..._

She was waiting for him in the kitchen with her arms wrapped around herself, and she unfolded them briefly to nudge a glass of bourbon across the counter towards him.

He stopped in his tracks, his eyes darting from the glass to her and back again. "What is it?"

She swallowed, took a deep breath, and glanced up at him. "They want to transfer me to Gitmo."

" _What_?!" She grimaced, and he lowered his voice. "Why?"

She shook her head, shrugged slightly. "They need more interrogators, I guess. They like how I handle suspects. You know I've been attending a couple of workshops recently…"

"Yeah, I remember you talking about how that one ass tossed a vase or something against the wall to make a point during his talk." He grabbed the glass off the counter, though he found himself oddly reluctant to drink.

"Yeah." She smiled, barely, and then it was gone as she ran her fingers through the bangs she was beginning to grow out. "But I just… God, they've been grooming me for this job and I didn't even realize it."

"You want to go?" He took a sip of the alcohol now, watching her closely, trying to ignore the way his throat was closing up.

"Sit inside more than I end up doing these days already? God no!" She rolled her eyes. "But the government isn't always too keen on giving people choices."

"They can't just—" he silenced himself with another sip.

Her smile was lopsided, tight, as she approached him, to rest her hands on his shoulders. "It's kind of a miracle this didn't happen sooner, you know. I mean, you're a fixture here—nobody else wants to deal with you, and I'm not sure how keen Morrow is on you some days, either—" her tone was half-teasing, "but me…"

He wrapped his arms around her and wondered how to keep his world as he cherished it from falling down around his ears.

* * *

It was his turn to wait, the next day, wiping his palms on his slacks. He'd tried to dress up, wear that blue shirt and the light tie he knew she liked, without looking like he was obviously trying.

She came in late, her mouth drawn, the remnants of adrenaline still draining from her eyes. He offered her a glass of wine, and she took it eagerly.

"Oh, thank you." He watched her throat flex as she took a larger gulp than was really polite, kept his eyes on her as he put a slice of lasagna in the microwave and turned it on.

"It'll be warm in minute." _Way to state the obvious, Marine._ "You said you didn't know exactly when you were going to get back."

She nodded. "The raid went well—we seized their servers—but apparently most of the tech in that warehouse was rigged to explode, and it was touch and go for a while."

He couldn't quite keep himself from reaching out to lay his fingers on her arm, but he didn't say anything, and she just smiled.

"Have you accepted the spot at Gitmo yet?"

"It wasn't exactly presented as one of multiple options."

He swallowed. "Received an official change of station."

The microwave sounded, and she moved around him to access her food. "No, those won't come for another few weeks, but Morrow wanted to give me a heads-up." She glanced down, the silverware in the drawer clinking as she fished out a fork. "They're planning on giving you McGee back." Her smile was slightly ironic.

He followed her to the table—he had to admit it looked kind of nice with the blue cloth runner and the vase in the middle, both her doing, though the plants were fake—and then, on second thought, went to grab a glass of water. His throat was too dry.

She glanced back at him. "Why are you standing in the doorway? We do have chairs, you know." She pushed the one beside her out with her foot.

He didn't sit down, waited for her to swallow before he bent down and kissed her. She set down her fork to wrap her arms around his shoulders, comb her fingers through his hair.

Her voice was low, throaty, when they parted. "Let me eat, and then we can do whatever you want."

"Marry me, Katie."

He was relieved the words were out, afraid now that they were, questioning his timing, questioning his presentation, watching her, holding his breath.

"You—" She drew back slightly, letting her arms fall, her eyes searching his. "I—you know it's not some guarantee they won't send me to Gitmo."

"But you'd have a reason to appeal the transfer." _God_ , he shouldn't have... "I just—I just want to keep you. With me. Or try to. Please. Nothing has to change."

She must have seen something on his face, because she bit her lip, and her eyelashes fluttered. "It's kind of a terrible reason to marry someone, to try to keep them from being transferred," she murmured.

"Best reason I've had in a long time." He paused, reminded himself to breathe. "I—look, Katie, if you don't want to, it's fine. We can-"

"I do want to." It was rushed, her tone breathy, and she reached for him again, her palm warm against the side of his jaw, the fingers of her other hand curling around his shirt collar. "I do, I—God—I really, really want to marry you."

He kissed her, soundly, sure she could taste his relief on his tongue as he slipped the small box from his pocket and slid the ring on her finger.

They compromised-a small legal ceremony first, with Abby and Ducky and their teams as their witnesses, and a religious ceremony for her family planned for later. Morrow wore a knowing smirk for a moment when they first told him, before he managed to school his features back into his usual poker face, and said he'd see what he could do.

Gibbs found it hard to be annoyed, either, when he heard the reason for the commotion behind the useless little cubicle walls was because Agents Todd (Gibbs, now, officially, though most of her coworkers still called her Todd) and McGee would be partnering as the heads of a specialized cybercrimes unit here in DC. Since they'd have their new offices one building over, he figured he'd just have to swipe his wife's coffee in the mornings before work instead.

He never let her go for coffee alone anyways, when he could, and even if she rolled her eyes at him every time, she always waited for him.

* * *

 **A.N.: Because my little shipper heart wants to see them married, even if I don't think it's something Gibbs would necessarily push for for himself, after three divorces. So I gave them a push. Am I sorry? I don't know.**


	46. Chapter 46

_A while later..._

His stomach sank when he saw her sitting on the couch in the living room, staring straight ahead, the TV silent, twisting a single glass of water in her hands.

She had looked like that when she had told him she had shot an innocent man that day, and when her brother had been in a car accident and had fallen into a coma, and when, after a particularly bad few months, she had announced she was going to stay with Marcy for several weeks.

He tried to recall anything that he knew of that might have prompted this—had Abby mentioned McGee saying anything bad had happened during their case? He drew a blank, so he cleared his throat, leaning against the doorway with one forearm. "I heard you went home early."

She glanced up, her eyes wide, her voice slightly hoarse when she spoke. "I wasn't expecting you for a couple more hours."

"Not much more we can do until the evidence comes back from the lab." He had files in the messenger bag slung over his shoulder, but there was a reason he had elected to look at them from home. "What's going on? You hardly ever leave the office before seven, at least."

She glanced back at the TV. "I—got sick."

There was an open package of saltines on a plate, atop the end table hiding behind the arm of the couch, and that made a little more sense now. They hardly ever ate in the living room.

"Anything I can do? Ginger ale?"

"I'm pregnant, Jethro." The words tumbled over her lips, her gaze snapping back to meet his eyes, and she leaned against the back of the couch as if those few words cost her a good deal of effort.

He realized suddenly that he was leaning more heavily against the wall, just staring at his wife, and had been for several moments.

"Jethro?" Her voice wasn't a whisper, but it was small all the same.

"I thought you said you were taking the pill." He wanted to move, go to her, but he still felt frozen.

"I am!" She pressed her lips together, glancing away, and took a sip of her water. "I have been. But Abby gave me the test results today."

He felt like he should be stumbling as he walked towards the couch, dropping the bag on the floor by the coffee table as he took a seat on one end. She drank, again, watching him, making no move to approach, and inhaled deeply. "I don't want to have an abortion."

He wanted to snarl at the mere possibility. "What makes you think suggesting that would even cross my mind?"

"God, I don't know, the fact that your first question was 'how did this happen?' The fact that you've been staring at me like I'm some sort of alien for the past five minutes?" Draining the last of her water, she leaned forward to set the glass down on the coffee table, and crossed her arms protectively over her midsection as she sat back again.

"C'mere." He reached for her, brushing his fingers over her arm, reaching around her shoulders to draw her in as she scooted closer. Hesitantly, she leaned against him, and he swallowed, feeling the beginnings of a smile creeping over his lips, taking a deep breath. "I never thought I'd ever have another kid." She stiffened, and he wrapped both his arms around her and dropped a kiss to her head, the words coming slowly. "But that doesn't mean I don't want them, Katie. I love you—both of you."

She nodded, slowly, and he felt her relax. "I'm scared," she murmured, but it held no tremble.

"Makes two of us." Children meant changes, big ones, and concerns, but he knew from experience the reward was worth it, and not accepting and loving this kid had never crossed his mind, no matter how much of a surprise it was. He kissed the top of her head again. "But I'm happy, too, Katie. So happy."

It was an odd, quiet sort of happiness, maybe not the ecstatic exuberance he'd felt when he'd first ever heard those words, but the world looked a little different now, filled with a little more color, and he allowed himself to grin as he looked down at his wife.

"Me, too." She tilted her head up to kiss him gently, the briefest of smiles on her lips, and buried her head in the crook of his neck with a contented sigh.

* * *

 **A.N.: So this was part two of that "I am addicted to fluffy happy endings even if stereotypical domestic bliss has never been their thing" thing. It's also the last chapter. I hope you enjoyed reading this, and I'd love to hear what you think of it.**


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